The weather cooled off this week – The fishing did not!
Most days were smokey and hazy this past week. We had no rain again this week and the creeks are drying up. The nights were surprisingly cool with temps down into the 40s. Daytime highs were in the 60s – 70s and surface temps on the main lake that had been into the 60s, fell back into the 50s. The most significant result from this past week was extremely high volume for walleye fishing.
I usually flip through the daily sheets and make a guess as to what the average daily catch rate was. The numbers in front of me were so strong that I decided to grab 24 random sheets from the middle of the stack and calculate the average. The answer – 56 walleyes over 18 in. per boat per day. And that is what it felt like. There were dozens of sheets where guides filled the front and the back (60 spaces) and ended up adding fish in the margins.
The numbers for big walleyes were also impressive. For the week, we caught and released 69 walleyes over 27 in., including 15 – 28s, 2 – 29s, 1 – 30, and 1 – 31.
We caught a few on plastics, but most of the walleyes were caught with light jigs (1/8 and ¼ oz.) with minnows. The key was speed and covering water. We use the term long lining all the time. It is the best description of how we float light jigs behind the boat in 6 – 12 ft. of water while we fish at .5 – 1.0 mph. Guests that are used to thumping the bottom with jigs require a little bit of coaching and faith, but it doesn’t take much when you boat 10 walleyes over 18 in. per hour.
The big pike are in the middle of transition. As they leave the shallow spawning bays, they search out locations that provide feeding opportunities. I overheard one of the senior guides coaching the first-year guides to think about the places where you can catch a bunch of little walleyes. And that is not a bad place to begin your search. We did catch quite a few incidental big pike while walleye fishing, but most were targeted. It is hard to beat a Williams Whitefish when you want to cover water hunting for big pike. For the week, we caught and released 28 pike over 37 in., including 8 – 38s, 4 – 39s, 2 – 41s, 1 – 42, and 1 – 43.
At the beginning of the week, it felt like it might be a super early bass season. We did see some smallmouth push up into the shallows of the warmest bays. The cooler temps and decreasing water temps put them back down by the end of the week. The few anglers that chased them caught a few, but it was not on. For the week, we caught and released 11 bass over 19 in., including 1 – 20. Faster moving swim baits and cranks were much more effective than topwater or tubes.
We do have some rain in the forecast for the coming week and I hope that will decrease the risk of more fires. From a fishing standpoint, I would love to see more of the same.
