Walleye food???

[slurpie]

So i fish a lake that gets 100 ft deep in spots tons of structure, everything you can think of. All fish species musky northern, walleye,rock large and small bass four diffrent sunnies crappies and tons of little perch never seen big ones. Question is this The walleyes i catch have small sunnies in them. But i cant find little sunnies in large groups or even one. But the perch are in huge schools in less than 25' of water. I have caught a few eyes around or in them but not alot. Why would the walleyes not eat the perch? I have never filleted one with a perch in it. Why would the walleyes eat sunnies and not perch?

[PerchJerker]

My guess --- and it's just a guess --- is that there's plenty of walleyes eating plenty of perch in your lake. Those walleyes are probably eating so many perch that it's hard to get them to chase anything else when they're feeding on the perch. The walleyes you're catching are probably perch eaters too, just not at the time you caught them.

To say it another way, you're probably being more successful catching walleyes that aren't feasting on the perch bonanza.

[JBMasterAngler]

It's possible that this lake has both stocked and natural walleyes in it. I've heard that stocked walleyes have a tendency to hang out in the weeds alot (at least in the metro area anyway). Obviously where you find weeds, you find sunnies The natural walleyes may be out in the classic structure eating the perch or hanging out in the open water chasing cisco.

[pushbutton]

slurpie,

think jb, nailed it. i think i am fishing the same lake you are with my 3 year old, so while we are usually targeting the sunfish, i have been seeing and now trying to fish for the eyes up shallow in the weeds. they were up shallow the entire season last year. i also know a couple of old timers who are successful and rarely fish below 40 ft on the same lake. the lake is heavily stocked and has decent natural reproduction.

[slurpie]

Yep were on the same lake. I'vs found some decent sunny spots but no eyes coming through not even northerns.