10/13/18 Walleye

It had been well over a month since the last time I went walleye fishing so I was due.  Wind was out of the SW but it was in single digits so I figured it wouldn’t be much of an issue.  I was more concerned about water clarity with all the rain we received in  the last week.  Turns out it wasn’t that bad, around 2 to 3 feet of visibility.  Surface temps were around 59 degrees, still to high but at least it was heading down instead of up.  Weeds weren’t much of an issue, just the single strands that I am accustomed to this time of year.

I dropped lines sometime around 5:30 pm and by 6 I had my first fish, a nice 22 inch male, biggest walleye I’ve landed in months.  Over the next hour I was able to land a couple more along with a few smallmouth bass.  It was a pretty slow and uneventful night.  There was one other boat out trolling and I saw them catch a couple of fish.  I kept my sonar going for awhile and most of the fish I marked were 2 to 4 feet off the bottom.  I know a few of them were walleye but I’m betting some of the other marks were smallies and a few trash fish.  Around 8 it was getting colder so I headed in.  The Fall bite is just starting and I have a few months left to fill the freezer for winter.  Weather permitting.  If the weather goes to hell I’ll just start chasing Steelhead earlier than I was expecting.

10/10/14 Walleye Report

Well after a 2 month hiatus I finally hit the river again.  Since my boat is still down for the count I gave my friend Richard a call and convinced him to take me out.  We hit the water around 6;30 pm and headed down south of The Cat.  The water is still very clear with a surface temp of 56 degrees.  Once it gets down to 50 it usually means game on and that shouldn’t be to far away.  There were some weeds which is understandable, with the temps falling the weeds are dying off and floating to Ohio.  Just have to deal with it.

I set up with a #11 Clown and a #9 Bleeding Olive Flash.  It didn’t take long and while Richard was still getting set up I snuck in a walleye and flipped at his feet.  We were off and running, 10 minutes later I was bringing in another one that came on the #9 BOF.  We started to work our way over to the stacks where Richard had picked up 5 last night.  There were a few boats long lining in The Slot so we had to maneuver around them at first.  Once we got into the discharge lane Richard picked up his first fish of the night on a Clown Nite Stalker.  That would be the only fish we would catch in that area for the next hour and a half.  I suggested we head back to where we started and once we did I was quickly bringing in another fish.  As I was bringing him in Richard hooked one and lost it behind the boat.  We slowly worked our way upstream and after about 10 minutes I put number 5 in the cooler.  After that one we pulled lines and spun back around and headed back to our initial starting point.  I caught number 6  which also turned out to be our last fish of the night.  We played around for a few more hours but we couldn’t get anything to hit.  Between 10:30 and 11:00 pm both of us got hung up pretty bad and after we got free we packed it in and headed home.  It had been a long day for me and I was tired.  We had 6 in the cooler and that wasn’t to bad, especially since I have been hearing a lot of people haven’t been catching anything.

So a quick re-cap.  We caught our first fish just after 6:30 and our last one around 9.  Three of the fish came on a #9 BOF on my 20 foot lead.  The other 2 came on a #11 Clown and a #11 Black/Gold Rapala, both on my 40 foot lead.  As I said before Richard got his on a Clown Nite Stalker.  He caught 4 the previous night on that same lure.  All the fish were 18 inch eaters, perfect size and in good shape.  The 3 I kept and cleaned all had baitfish in them the size of a #9 Rapala.  Hint, Hint!!!!

That’s it for now.  Richard and I are supposed to go out again next Thursday and take my Dad out for his first Handlining trip of the year.  My boat will not be ready until next spring so if anyone is looking for a passenger just let me know.  Hint, Hint!!!!

 

A Year in a Life – September

September is an odd month.  Walleye fishing can be very hit and miss as the fish start to transition form their summer feeding patterns to their fall/winter pattern.  I have had more days where I come up empty handed in September than any other month.  This never bothers me because I am actually thinking more about small game hunting than I am  thinking about fishing.  I still got out, except this year with my boat being down, but it is not as frequent.  I’m kind of in a holding pattern until the water temps get down to that 50 degree range.  Getting there can take awhile or it can happen in a week, it all depends on the weather.

When I do go I experiment more with lure selection this time than any other.  By now the lower river is full of yoy smallmouth bass and the emerald shiners are stilla round and they are bigger as well.  Some Gizzard Shad may have started to show up but the bigger run is still months away.  Knowing all this I will run everything from #13 to #5 Rapala’s and spoons.  It all depends on what is most abundant.  I pay particular attention to the warm water discharge to see what is jumping and just how many crane’s, herons and eagles are in the area.  If I see lots of minnows I’m sticking to the smaller size lures in natural colors, especially if the water is still clear, which it usually is.  If some shad are in though out go the #11 and #13 Rapala’s.  I usually hold off on the bigger lures until October when it is colder but you never know.  I don’t waste a lot of time dragging the same bait around.  If it’s not producing in the first half and hour it is getting replaced.  I mean I really play around now.  Different sizes, styles, colors, action, speed….anything to try and trigger a strike.  Now it could just be that their aren’t any fish in the area.  The smaller ones that were around all summer may have moved back out to the lake and the bigger fish haven’t moved in yet.  I don’t know for sure.  I don’t have any tracking beacons on the fish.  I do wish I could get access to all the movement data on the walleye swimming around with the radio transmitters in them.  THAT WOULD BE AWESOME!!!!!  Since I don’t I just have to keep trying and hope that it gets better in October.  Either that or I just go out and shoot squirrels which most years is more productive.