LUXEMBURG – Under muted light Sunday morning, Green Bay stretched west of Red River County Park like a mysterious, gray expanse.
In places jumbled plates of ice were piled in ridges. In others the surface slumped into dark, slushy hollows.
In the distance a large ship pushed through open water.
And something extremely rare for these parts powered its way over the bay’s ice and toward the park’s boat landing: an airboat.
My ride had arrived.
Bret Alexander, owner of Alexander’s Guide Service and Ice Fish Green Bay, rumbled toward shore, cut the engine and slid to a stop.
“Meet our newest addition to the fleet,” said Alexander, 53, motioning to the long, flat-bottomed craft. “It’s not something we planned on. But with this winter I had to do something.”
Ice conditions make Wisconsin sport fishing a challenge in winter of 2023-24
The winter of 2023-24 is making headlines for being not like a winter. The unusually warm temperatures have limited ice formation on waterbodies in Wisconsin and the Great Lakes.