The Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has kickstarted the ice fishing season for the northern region in mid-December 2025, following a cold snap.
Arctic cold blasts were settling on lakes and rivers across three-quarters of the northern region around December 9, according to the DNR.
This means fishers can take their baiting gear to such spots as the Mississippi River, Clear Lake and Big Creek Lake.
Here, ice hides wallaye, northern pike, yellow perch among other fish that settle in large numbers on lake bottoms during winter.
Anglers can use simple jigs (artificial baits) or natural bait like minnows to attract the fish up into the ice.
But it takes care to know the best place to fish, especially in the early stages of the season when ice is still forming.
The DNR advises that freeze thickness depends on the depth of the water body – with river ice 15% weaker than on lakes.
This weakness is pertinent to rocky or tree-strewn waters where thermal temperatures cause ice to melt faster than elsewhere.
Popular Species for Northern Ice Fishing
Although no ice cover is 100% secure, the department finds 4 to 15 inches in ice depth as reasonably safe for fishers.
Harvesters can use the tip-ups of their fishing rods measuring 18 to 24 inches long to make holes in the ice. The pointed rods hover bait over such species as wallaye, northern pike and crappie.
Wallaye easily fall for such artificial inducement as jigging spoons that anglers move livelily inside the water.
Crappies in their part come up in abundance during feeding time at sunset, attracted by glowing jigs or even live baits like wax worm.
Although ice fishing is mostly recreational, it complements Iowa’s annual shrimp and aquaculture turnover worth $3.8 million (2022). The below data offers a general introduction to not only northern state ice fishing but for all seafood in Iowa.
Iowa Fishing Industry Statistics
Fishing is one of Iowa’s most important sectors. Agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting together earn the state between $4.287 billion (Q4, 2005) and 15.11 billion (Q2, 2025), per the Federal Reserve, St. Louis.
Revenue from fishing comes from not only sales but licence fees. According to the Iowa government, fishing licence income clocked $42,004,426 in 2025, up from $36,922,737 in 2024. Hence, Iowa’s Game Trust Fund attained $70,796,929 in 2025 from license fee income and other recreational fishing revenue.
Aquaculture is one of the key sources of revenue in Iowa’s fishing industry. In 2018, the niche generated over $3.8 million from sales of shrimp and multiple other species. Iowa’s aquaculture farms count among the 271 fish farms across the Midwest that in turn represent 9.2% of federal aquaculture farms (2022).
How much does recreational fishing earn Iowa?
Recreational fishing such as ice fishing is economically important to Iowa. For example, the 4th Congressional District in western Iowa contributed $142.2 million from recreational fishing in 2018. According to the American Sportfishing Association, this amounted to supporting over 1,000 fishing-related jobs in the jurisdiction.