The hardiest of bare-bones anglers muffle up in a snowsuit, turn a five-gallon bucket upside down on the frozen lake, cut a hole in the ice and drop a line.
Upscale technology-wise from the bucket sitters are the canvas shelters and plywood-fabric portable fish houses. These pop up on pleasant afternoons and early in the season before the ice is strong enough to bear the weight of vehicles.
By January, favorite fishing grounds like Lake Bemidji become true villages with hundreds of fishing shanties hauled onto the ice by pickup trucks. Many are equipped with heaters, camp chairs and other furniture. After dark, the glow of electric lights and even TVs pinpoint the individual fish houses around the lake.
Many fishing shacks are factory models, but homemade houses show the ingenuity of builders to meet personal preferences and needs.
Come March, the shanty town disappears house by house. By spring fishing opener, the lakes have resumed their liquid state and the fish houses go into storage until the turn of seasons brings back the deep freeze.
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Monte Draper's photos capture the variety of fishing shanties, as well as the pleasure winter brings to those who relish northern Minnesota's extremes.
