Be forewarned. If you’re expecting some ground-breaking fishing news in this column, you will be disappointed.

We’re in the revolving cycle of sunny, cold, warm and mostly dry.

Nothing has changed for several weeks. Temperatures have varied between frigid and mild, but I still see some ice on local ponds when I drive by, and the Boise River is still flowing at its normal winter levels.

Cascade is still the best place for ice fishing solely on conditions. Horsethief Reservoir continues to produce a lot of trout for ice anglers.

Magic Reservoir is still open water in the middle and bookended by icy areas on the north and south ends.

Steelhead rivers are available, but conditions aren’t ideal. Clear Lake Country Club still doesn’t know when it’s going to stock trout.

This is what we have, and it doesn’t look like it’s going change by the weekend or even the foreseeable future.

I’m starting to look ahead, but I don’t expect a remarkable turn around. I’m starting to assume we’re going to have a dry winter and possibly an early spring.

I’m curious what that means. Last year’s big snowpack and wet spring filled reservoirs, and rivers flowed high. I know some of that water got stored, so I am hoping that the surplus will lessen the blow of a dry winter.

Catching bluegill in March or April also wouldn’t be a bad thing, rather than waiting until June. Maybe I am grasping for silver linings here.

But I also know the obvious, unavoidable truth. Fish need water. Good water years typically pay dividends for years, and the reverse is also true for droughts. You need only look at Blacks Creek Reservoir to see the effects of drought years. A once-thriving fishery is now a weedy marsh.

Hopefully this dry winter will be a fluke, and things will return to normal, but it’s hard not to think about it happening again, and happening soon.