The lake’s bluegills are reaching 7 and 8 inches and are present in good numbers. There are numerous smaller bait-stealers around, so if you’re having trouble with them, fish a few feet below the little guys. Monster bluegills will hold below and maybe a bit off to the side of their smaller counterparts along rocks and weed edges.

The crappies will provide good winter action as well. Right now, they’re covering many different year-classes, so you’ll catch them in a variety of sizes.

Park at the Gene Stratton Porter state memorial for the best walk-on access to productive water. Sylvan Lake is a 669-acre manmade water at Rome City in Noble County.

Call District 4 at (219) 691-3181 for more information. For tourism information, contact the Noble County Convention and Tourism Bureau at (877) 202-5761 or visit online at www.nccvb.org.

ROUND LAKE
Panfishermen can be a finicky lot and have certain ways that they like to do things. Sticking with the old family secret baits won’t be necessary here. Getting on the ice is the first step and after that, just about everything works.

Round Lake is renowned as a winter panfish lake, especially for first-ice fishing. It seems that every year the story repeats itself with nice catches of bluegills, redear sunfish and crappies. The bluegills are the main draw with sizes generally running into trophy specimens.

The southwest corner of the lake normally has the first safe ice cover, according to Ed Braun, the District 4 fisheries biologist. Some anglers in the Hoosier State feel that there’s never safe ice, while others will fish on 2 or 3 inches, or less, and take their chances.

Round Lake comes by its name honestly. It’s circular and small at only 48 acres with an average depth of 11 feet. Depths drop uniformly around the shoreline until reaching about 25 feet in the center. An advantage to this setup is that you can explore differing depths by only moving a short distance. The disadvantage is that the fish can be anywhere.

The most recent fisheries survey on the lake was conducted in 2007 and it showed good numbers of both bluegills and largemouth bass. Surprisingly, the DFW found that the bluegill population was overabundant and consisted mainly of harvestable fish. Bluegills took top billing and ranged to well over 7 1/2 inches. The lake’s largemouths ran fairly small, with only a few bass surpassing the 14-inch minimum length limit.

Sporadic catches of yellow perch and crappies are available along with the occasional channel cat. Round Lake also offers the possibility of taking warmouths, pumpkinseeds, redears, green sunfish and spotted gar.

Walk-on access is from the east side of the lake where there is a small boat launch at the American Legion Post. The ramp is north of 1000N off Troyer Road near Laketon in Wabash County. The access is open to the public at no charge. There is no state-owned access on the lake.

For more information, contact District 4 at (219) 691-3181. Call the Wabash County Convention and Visitor’s Bureau for information on lodging at (800) 563-1169 or visit online at www.wabashcocvb.com.