This story is part of a larger series on ice-fishing culture. To read all series posts, click here.
Our ice shack isn’t pretty and it didn’t cost much, but there are few places in this world I enjoy more.
The Snake Chaser began its life of recreational pleasure as a 1971 Trailblazer Tenderfoot. As originally outfitted, the 16-foot camper trailer weighed 3,600 pounds. That’s largely how it came to us. But after a series of crude (yet effective) modifications, it now weighs in at approximately 3,200 pounds. This includes gear and life-sustaining supplies — corn meal, gun powder, ham hocks and guitar strings. It is an ideal ice fishing machine.
Original equipment included a three-burner stove and oven, furnace, sink, deluxe cabinetry, three beds, a dining room table and ample closet space. We tore out the beds and most of the closet walls and ran a bench all the way around three sides. We also replaced the table, reducing the size and raising it up slightly to make it easier to maneuver around.
This is our seventh year fishing out of her. She spent the first couple years nameless and then, very organically, became the Snake Chaser. We mostly fish for northern pike, and the little ones are commonly referred to as snakes because they’re long, skinny and mean. At least for their diminutive size. We catch a lot of them in the 16- to 20-inch range. That’s basically where the name came from. It’s also a little bit of a play on the guys who call themselves musky hunters.
It’s not as if we lack the ability to catch bigger fish, at least not entirely. It has more to do with our chosen body of water. A 30-inch northern on Boom Lake is a rarity. A treasure. And you have to sift through some snakes to get one. I’m still sifting.
Beginnings
Our first shack was built in December 2003. I had just moved back to town that summer to take care of my mom after she was diagnosed with cancer, and my friend Steve suggested we build an ice shack. Another friend Tom — we all grew up playing hockey together — gave us a rusted out tandem-axle trailer to build it on.
The structure was simple. We framed it mostly with 2x2s to keep the weight low, skinned it with quarter-inch plywood, insulated with the cheapest Styrofoam we could and find cut in two little pieces of Plexiglas for a view of the outside. We threw an old carpet remnant from my basement on the floor, and brought in a card table and a few folding chairs, a hook for a lantern, a little single-speaker radio and a propane heater. That was about it. We had a hell of a lot of fun in it, played a ton of cribbage, caught a few fish.
Our tradition of writing on the walls began in that old shack. I wish we still had the foam sheets that told the stories of those early days. But time moves on, and that shack wasn’t built for the long run. We weren’t actively looking for a new shack, but one day my friend Turk called from the local gun and pawn shop and said he just took in an old camper in amazing condition. We got the camper for $300 and gave the old shack to Turk’s dad, after leaving it alongside an unsuspecting friend’s pole barn for a year.
