A Wild Weather Ride:
The week began with summer, eased into early Fall, and finished with a Hurricane. I exaggerate a little, but not much. Everyone was at the lodge for shorelunch today. As the guys were cooking fish under the boat house awning in the rain, I could see their breath. We ended the week with sustained winds of 25 mph, rain, 2 – 3 ft. waves, and high temps that barely cracked 50. Looking back at the guide sheets, it is hard to believe that it was 80 on Sunday. It was a rollercoaster of a weather week.
Even though the weather was turbulent, the predominant pattern for walleyes remained the same. It is a little unusual for us to stay so consistently focused on main lake rock in 20 – 30 ft. at this time of year, but that is where we found most of the walleyes. There were a scattered few found on main lake sand, but not worth more than a 20-minute stop.
For the week, we caught and released 45 walleyes over 27 in., including 9 – 28s, 2 – 29s, 1 – 30, and senior guide Brett McCallum caught his all-time personal best at 32 in. It was an absolute Monster. Guide sheets averaged 35 walleyes over 18 in. per boat per day, but that includes the quieter results from the blowout days. The highest daily guide sheet total was 101.
Successful tactics changed dramatically throughout the week. It was challenging to keep track of every nightly round table meeting. Our in-house formula remains the same; search, hunt, identify a key depth, and then determine fish mood, and evaluate with catch rate. It sounds simple until you are on the tiller. If you cruise over neutral fish with speed or slow down over active fish and don’t recognize the mistake, then you set yourself back an hour. As guides, we know we are fighting the clock to get the win. This week was again evenly split between big jigs and Gulp and lighter jigs with live bait fished vertically. Many of the biggest walleyes were caught with ¾ oz. jigs and 6.5 in. Berkley Nemesis pulled at speed in 20 – 28 ft. of water.
Pike fishing was not a primary focus this week, but there were some groups that put their time in. The results were better when the weather was not as rough and cold. For the week, we caught and released 11 over 37 in., including 4 – 38s, 2 -39s, and Howard Lampert caught his personal best at 42.25 in. The pattern remains the same – spoons over weeds near deep water.
The Take Away:
I have been part of many great guide staffs, but this one is different. From top to bottom, this crew is bold. They are not afraid to go out and take a chance on a new spot, in fact the results have been so good, that it has become the new pattern. I had a day off this week and I took Missy on a boat ride so that I could auto chart and learn some of the new spots that the crew has been successful on. The young guns are definitely keeping me on my toes and they remind me of how powerful an exponential learning curve can be with shared information. The results and the vibe are contagious, and I am proud to be part of it.
