All nighter at the Berry...(brrrrrr) (Added Pics...)

[N.E.T.O.]

Edit: Added the pics. Even thought there was a sheet of ice coating the inside of the QuickFish II, it really was warm as long as the heater was going...


We (Cousin and I) arrived at the empty Ladders parking lot Friday night about 6:30 p.m. We headed out to our honey hole, 1/2 over to the island. Conditions were clear, no wind and COLD. By the time we got to our spot we were sweating hot from the walk. The QuickFish II performed flawlessly. Easy up, easy down, easy to move and warm inside! With a lantern and a propane heater we were toasty warm...until about 3:00 a.m. when we realized we had to start rationing our remaining 1 propane cylinder out of the 5 we had brought or it was gonna be REALLY cold. Fishing was slow slow slow. By sunup we had only iced about a dozen fish between us...and we caught darn near every fish we saw on the finder. They just weren't coming around. We caught a lot more once the sun came up but we only stayed a couple hours then headed home to get some sleep! We ende dup with 22 fish total, with only one over the slot. We moved 3 times. Started in 35 feet, moved to 25 feet, moved to 20 feet, then moved back to the original spot in 35 feet and decided we were not moving again. We ended up using my butane hiking stove for heat the last hour or so trying to ration our last propane cylinder with the lantern way low. When the sun came up and we didn't need the light anymore, we hooked up the propane to the big heater and turned it up the thaw out!
We were both glad we pulled the high adventure sub-zero (literally) all nighter at the Berry, but we both agree that the fishing just wasn't worth the effort (or pain!). We will probably just continue to go at Dark Thirty every Saturday morning. The next time I do an all nighter on the ice, the "hut" better have central heat, a bed, a fireplace, a kitchen...oh, and a BATHROOM! (It's COLD out there when ya gotta go!) My biggest complaint is that I forgot I would be sitting in a lawn chair for 15 hours. I can't walk now. I'm permanently hunched over.

To those who want to try it:
- The shack was comfy with a lantern and a heater. TAKE MORE PROPANE CYLINDERS THAN 5!!!!
- Make sure you have a bed to lay down on when the fishing is slow.
- A 6 man shack is probably just about right for 2 people to do an overnighter in, as long as its got two strato-loungers. Of course, that is just speculation since we spent the night in our cozy two man shelter, which I think is really just about big enough for my cousin and all his junk.[]
- When you go out to take a whiz at 4:00 a.m. and its -5 outside and you come back into the hut when you are done and announce that you think its warmed up a little outside...that means your extremeties are numb and you can't feel how cold it really is.
- Ibuprofin is your friend.
- If you don't want things to get wet...leave them home. Everything I took got wet. If it wasn't dripped on from the condensation, it was splashed on by a fish.
-Fishing side by side in a 2 man shack in 35 feet of water...you WILL get tangled up together...more than once.

All in all it was a good experience. We were like zombies walking off the ice in the morning. We think some of our buddies from BFT waved at us as we were walking off the ice, but we really are not sure...we can't remember how we got to the truck.

Wow, I just reread this and its long. And I think I typed most of it in my sleep.

Randy
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[redman]

You're hard core, man...too bad the fishing was slow, that would have really made up for the cold. I think I'll rethink my desire to pull an all nighter. Thanks for the info!
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[fsh4fun05]

Sounds like a good time anyway you put it. I've been looking into getting a heater, what kind do you have?
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[eskamo]

We got tired of paying $2+ for the one pound tanks a few years ago changed to 11 pounder. It holds about 3 gallons of propane @ $2.60 per gallon. One gallon is about 4.7 lbs. Might make your next all nighter more fun if you don't have to ration heat. I saw some guys walk by me about 10:00 or so headed to the parking lot. Fishing was best for us around 7:30 a.m. Beautiful day on the ice today at the ladders.
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[Kent]

Randy, you sounded a little tired when I called you at 5:00 AM. I have never made it past 2:00 AM ice fishing, and it is no fun taking down an ice shack and packing up in that bitter cold. The hard part for me in doing the entire overnighters at Strawberry (have done several in my boat) is staying awake driving home the next day. I always when I have heard guys say that it gets warm ice fishing at Strawberry when the sun goes down because the wind stops blowing. My experience has been that the temperature plummets when the sun goes down.
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[Habs_Fan]

Great post and some good advice. I'd like to pull an all nighter sometime this winter. A cot for some cat naps when fishing is slow is a great idea, not to mention making the drive home a little easier.
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[Theekillerbee]

Sounds like a "fun" night! Thanks for sharing the report and the experience. I've debated doing the same, but I just can't get the courage to brave it. I think I'd rather rent a room at the lodge, and just head out at first light.
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[BearLakeMack]

[font "Comic Sans MS"][black][size 3]The only way I'm pulling an all nighter at the Berry is at the Strawberry Lodge! Prime rib and a jacuzzi![/size][/black][/font]
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[Flycasting]

Ditto. Done it before... very nice. []
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[N.E.T.O.]

Fsh4Fun05,
It is a Mr. Heater single burner. Very compact and worked great. It has 3 settings and we couldn't stand to have it past the lowest setting or we got too hot. It does go thru a can of propane about every 3 hours even on the lowest setting. 5 cans of propane wasn't enough for 12 hours of darkness with both the heater and then lantern going!
Randy
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[lavaman]

Amen to what BLM says!!!
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[N.E.T.O.]

Hey Eskamo,
Good idea on the 11 pound tank. Does it come with a hose to attach to the heater? In the pic you can see our heater (without the propane bottle attached...this was during our rationing phase!) and you can see the top of our lantern, and also our little camping stove that we were using for heat to ration the last big propane bottle on the lantern.
Yes, that was us leaving the ice around 10:00. You could tell it was us because we probably looked like we were wandering aimlessly!
It was truly an awe inspiring day once the sun came up. Blue sky, crisp air and hundreds of ice fisherman on the ice!
Randy
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[eskamo]

The 5 FT. hoses run about $14.00 at sportsmans. I use a heater cooker like yours in our Qfish3 and a paulin tough pup in the Qflip2. I leave the tank outside in the sled or on a piece of plywood so that it doesn't freeze to the ice. Its amazing how much gear you can collect each year. I've been talking about doing an all nighter with my sons but haven't put it together yet. The lodge sounds good after seeing the ice on the inside of your shelter. Thanks for taking the time to post your adventure.
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[fsh4fun05]

HOLYCRAP!!! Those pics look cold!!!! I'm headed up in the morning to the Berry to try the new hut. I hope to see some BFT'ers out on the hard deck, I'll be East (I think) of Mud Creek in Black hut sporting a sticker. HAPPY NEW YEAR WHOOOO!!!!!
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[One_eyed_jack]

Zoomed past the berry at about 4 am Saturday, it looked dang cold. Read 8 to 10 below on the vehicle readout although the glass felt colder. The Uinta basin was not much warmer, a whooping zero when I got to the duck blind that morning.

Starvation is still not capped if anyone wanted to know.
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[dallas31]

Is the strawberry lodge a nice place? is it $expensive$ I like the idea for Prime Rib and a hot tub.
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[Out4Trout]

[cool]Man, sounds like your heater is a real gas hog, dude! You need to invest in a little buddy. Supposedly, one bottle last for 6 hours in them.

Sounds like you had a great time though considering. When I went out on a night expedition with Fishing4fun last year, there were 4 of us guys but he had his ice shelter plus his massive tarp addition and it worked great and there was lots of room. We didn't stay all night though. Probably were there from about 7:30 p.m. till 2 or 3 in the a.m. when the bite slowed down. Lotsa fun though if you do it right. Did you guys land any big ones (aka, over the slot limit)?
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[addicted2fishin]

I would say your problem is using the gas lantern. Although it does put out a little heat for you, those things drink down the propane. Go get a couple of those little flourescent lanterns at walmart. Flourescent doesn't take a lot of power, so a set of batteries will last quite a while.
This will also help cut down the carbon monoxide in that tent. Running both a heater and lantern, I would be very afraid of the level of carbon monoxide that would build up. That stuff can build up really fast. Even an hour or two can be dangerous.
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[N.E.T.O.]

Carbon Monoxide was 1st on my list. I actually had a Carbon Monoxide detecter with me, and we had both "vents" open inthe shack, as well as a little of the zipper door open. Rather be a little chilly than dead!
Our lantern went from 7:00 p.m to 3:00 a.m. at full burn on one bottle of propane. My Mr. Heater claims to go 6 hours on LOW on one bottle of propane but we only got about 2.5 hours on LOW on each bottle. We started with 5 bottles, but I now believe that 2 were not full bottles.
The shack was VERY comfortable (heat wise!) as long as the Mr. Heater was on LOW. (Too HOT with it on Medium or High!).
At 3:00 a.m. we had 1 full propane can left, and 1 full can of Hiking Stove fuel for my little butane hiking stove. Knowing we had 4 hours of dark/cold left, we knew that we could burn the lantern for at least 4 hours even on high and only burn 1/2 that propane bottle. So we opted to use the hiking stove for heat, which is about 1/3 the BTU's of the Mr. Heater on LOW and burn the lantern at the same time. At least that way we knew we would have heat/light until sunup.
Anyway, we were semi-warm between 3:00 a.m. and 6:30 by using the hiking stove and the lantern, and by then we could see well enough that we switched the last propane can back to the Mr. Heater and cranked it up! (It felt wonderful!).
My basic complaint was not the cold or temperature inside the shack...it was the 15 hours of sitting on a lawn chair! It really got to my back and I kept on having to get up and walk around outside. I would do it again in a heartbeat if my shack were big enough to have a cot inside so that I could lay down when I got tired!
Randy
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[Hellsangler69]

NETO , I don't think you need to worry about[font "Verdana,Arial,Helvetica"][black][size 1][font "Verdana,Arial,Helvetica"][black][size 1] [size 2]Carbon Monoxide with those propane stoves unless you have one like MGB that is missing the screen . In a small hut you need to worry about all the oxygen being burned up from the heater . That will ruin your day just as bad .
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