Human beings come together in villages for all sorts of reasons: Protection from predators and enemies, the convenience of a marketplace, simple companionship. Some villages are permanent settlements, while others are temporary — tent cities that come and go. And then there are the ones that exist somewhere between those two states: ice fishing villages.

Every winter for as far back as most people around here can remember there has been a village on Albert Lea Lake, right where the channel carrying water from Fountain Lake emerges, where the water is deeper and faster. Every winter 30 or more shanties appear, a few at a time at first, but then more and more as the ice thickens. Add to that number the temporary shelters put up just for one day at a time, and there can be a couple hundred men, women and kids out on the ice, putting up with cold wind as they hunt for fresh perch or walleye for supper.

To the uninitiated or ignorant, the village looks like a bunch of homemade shacks — which they are, in a way. But any collection of buildings can look that way, whether on land or on ice. What’s more important are the people inside those shacks.

The permanence of this ice village is because of those men and women, who come back year after year, generation after generation. It’s as if they carry ice fishing in their genes and are drawn to this spot on Albert Lea Lake. It shines out to them as a prime destination.

Greg Stenzel, who lives in Wells when he’s not living on the ice, is one of them.

He’s one of the “visitors” on Albert Lea Lake, coming here regularly with his brother Kevin and other friends.

One January weekend, his neighbors included Tim Vrieze of Albert Lea and Steve, Kathy and Nick Kauffmann, also from Wells. They all avoid the DNR license fee by setting up and taking down their fish house every day. The ones that stay out on the ice all the time have to be licensed. They display the name and address or driver’s license number of the owner.

Steve Kauffmann came out to fish on the ice with his parents and grandparents back when he was a boy. He remembers going out on Sunday afternoons and people visiting back and forth between the ice houses. One time their pastor came out fishing with them after church, and his mother decided they’d better keep the beer in a neighbor’s hut, with people sneaking out every so often to drink one. Halfway through the afternoon, the preacher stood up to stretch his arms and said the day was perfect. He just wished he’d brought some cold beer with him.

Duane Smith of Austin is another resident of the ice fishing village. Along with his friend Jim Nelson, he sets up on Albert Lea Lake as well as above Ramsey Dam in Austin. The village appears slowly at first, he said.

“People wait to see the first house appear and then start following, gaining confidence in the ice as they see others out there,” he said.

Smith and Nelson talked about one of the issues that can sometimes disturb the peace: putting houses too close together. By law, the houses are supposed to be 10 feet apart, but it’s still considered good form to talk to the people who are already there before putting one’s own house into position, Nelson said.

According to Smith, it’s usually pretty easy to talk to people about it, and unlike other kinds of fishing, people aren’t too secretive about their success. “Most people, when they are catching fish, aren’t too quiet about it. It’s like any neighborhood; nobody can keep a secret for long,” he said.

Over at their other place in Austin, Smith and Nelson are helping to organize a small fishing tournament in February, as a cancer research fundraiser. That’s another way that ice fishing villages are like their landlocked counterparts: organizing ways to help people in the community that need help.

In modern ice fishing villages, residents still chat and keep an eye out for each other, just like in the past. Not too much has changed.

Oh, it’s not the kind of community where people borrow eggs or sugar for baking, but people make new friends, greet old ones, share news about themselves and family and watch out for everybody.

There are problems sometimes, especially when a village is as close to a city like the one on Albert Lea Lake, Smith said. People’s shanties do get broken into, although that’s harder to do without getting caught when people are around, he said. And people can be out in the village just about any time, he added.

Kauffmann never keeps anything in his fish house and leaves it unlocked, saving himself the expense of a broken door or window. He remembers that one winter, in a different village, equipment and supplies were stolen from 30 of the shanties, but because people keep on eye out for each other, when the perpetrator came back later to try and sell his loot to others, they nabbed him and called the police.

Whether people are inside their ice houses often depends on whether the fish are biting, and when they are, there can be people out on the ice at just about any time of the day or night and in just about any kind of weather — until the weather turns warm, however, and the ice gives way to slush and open water.

Then the village disappears for the warm months, scattered into garages, sheds and basements throughout the region, waiting to return when the frozen days and nights of winter return.