How to catch a Walleye

[Griggs]

Alright, heres the deal. I'm a Bass and Muskie fisherman. And I've got a pretty good understanding how to fish them, but Walleyes, not so much. So I've got a couple of weeks here before the Bass opener and I want to get out at least a few times and try for some Walleye. Whenever I catch Walleye its more on accident.

So, if you can help me with this goal I would appricate it.

1 Walleye in the month of May. I want to intentionally catch 1 walleye.

I live in the southwest, and I fish Prior quite a bit, I'm also thinking about Parley near Waconia, I heard it has some nice Walleye. Any lake in the southwest metro will be fine, however I might get a bit overwhelmed by Minnetonka or Waconia.

If someone could give me one or two tactics and presentation, Some easy location Ideas = success?

Thanks a lot

btw - I have a 16' 4" boat, bow mount trolling motor and a depth finder, so equipment shouldn't be a problem. Thanks

[Surface Tension]

Start out by getting yourself a lake map, 1/4 oz jigs, minnow harness (spinners), slip bobs and either buy or make up some rigs(Lindy rigs).

Study the structure along the shorelines, save the mid lake stuff for later on this summer. Look for areas with breaks, points, and reefs and mark them. If you can find wood or a weed line before a decent break it be a good place if you have the warm water piling into it. Take out the map and start testing your pre-picked spots. Match any of the above presentations that best fit that spot. For instance on most breaks I'll choose a jig. Or say you've chosen a weedline or shoreline without much contour but the wind has been piling warm water on it, a spinner w/minnow/leech or Lindy rig trolled along it might be the most effective way to work that area. Slip bobs would come out if I needed to stay close to cover.

Work your areas over and cover the varying depths of your pre-selected spots, if you get something going keep at, if not move on to the next spot but keep the area you just fished in mind for a different period during the day or different weather conditions. What I'm getting at is use all your time on the water as a learning experience.

[harvey lee]

Surface Tension has given you some good eye info to get you going.

A couple of lakes you could try if not to far away is Madison Lake by that town and also Tetonka or Washington in that same general area.There are also many other good eye lakes in that same location.If you look at a map you will see all the lakes.

All of these lakes are between AV and Mankato.

[Borch]

Another tactic is to put on a #5 or #7 shad rap and troll the edges of flats and weed edges. This is particularly effectiveearly in the season and early morning and evenings. If it's windy. over cast or the water is stained it'll work all day long. A #5 will run around 5ft +/- a ft and a #7 will run 8ft +/- a ft on 10 lb mono or equivanlent braid with 100 ft of line out. You can troll with the big motor or a bowmount trolling motor in the 1.7 - 2.5 mph range.

This should work great on the lakes Harvey Lee brought up as well as many others.

[Griggs]

Alright thanks guys. I'll give it a try.

As far as trolling with the spinners or lindy rigs, do you use the big motor for that too or just troller?

[harvey lee]

I would switch to the trolling motor for the other.Speed of the boat can also change from hour to hour in a day.

[Surface Tension]

I use my bow mount Auto Pilot when ever possible while pulling spinners or rigs. I fish a lot of reservoirs so dragging bottom will get you hung up quick. Getting your spinner tuned to run within 1' off the bottom is critical so one thing I'm a stickler on is keeping a constant speed along with staying on coarse. While watching the sounder I can adjust that depth to match bottom contours. A long time ago I fished without sonar. One thing I learned to do is accurately get my spinners to run in that 1' zone. Get your troll speed and cast out, give your rig time to settle in. Now quickly drop your rod tip back and look what happens.

You line will go limp or you'll see line pull out. What you want to see is your line pull out about 1' and then go limp so either let more line out or reel some up. Do this same thing while trolling over structure and you'll find that spinner is always in the zone. One last thing, after dropping that tip back and its hit slack, give that rod a snap forward get to the rig off the bottom, this does two things. It pops the rig out of rocks or wood and it sets the hook on eyes that you turned on with the drop.

Start doing that and you'll put more fish in the boat.

[BobT]

I've usually considered my bait/lure when deciding on trolling speed. It does little good if you use a spinner rig but troll too slowly for the spinner to function. Might as well just put on a jig. The opposite is also true so test the action of your rig against the speed you're moving. Certain lures only function as designed at certain speed ranges.

Bob

[TommyJ33]

KISS method (even a kid can catch em)

Find metro lake that has walleyes

use chartruese jigs and fatheads (1/4oz to 3/8 oz)

Drift along outside weed edge (stay close!!) 13-18 FOW

fish from 6am to 10am or 4 pm to 8pm

use just enough jig weight to get you to the bottom depending on depth and wind speed.

Good luck

[BlackwaterStout]

When you are trolling a live bait spinning harness how much weight do you generally need to use if you are fishing 10-15 feet of water at 2.2 mph? Would it be cool to use 14 pound fireline with a 4 foot 12 pound flouro leader?

[PerchJerker]

This has been mentioned in the other posts, but if you want to target walleyes, go to a lake with walleyes in it. I don't think Prior or Parley are your best choices.

I used to live in Lakeville and we went to Canon by Faribault quite often for walleyes, winter and spring. Been several years since I fished it but it was pretty good when I was going there. It's dark water, the fish will bite during the day and there's no telling what species you'll catch. Couple things you can try ....

There's a river channel in the middle of the lake, straight out from the public access, and some flats around the channel. Lindy rigs and leeches work well in these areas, the flats, the top edge of the channel, and the bottom of the channel. A jig and minnow would work too, if you keep it small enough you might hang a few big crappies. Same goes for the major point across from the public access.

Great lake for trolling too, tie on a shad rap and try 1.8 to 2.2, maybe even 2.5. I'd try in the area of the channel or the big point.

Good luck.

[bgreen82]

with the fathead on a jig, do you fish that under a bobber or just have some kind of depthfinder on that?

[Griggs]

Anything in the area of Shakopee that would be good? I'm not looking for too much a drive. For now, just want to work on some tactics.

[PerchJerker]

I do not slip bobber fish for walleyes very often. With a jig and minnow I usually drift or use my electric motor, keep the jig on/near the bottom, experiment with dragging, pulling, hopping, snapping, swimming, etc. to see what the fish prefer.

Griggs - check out where Cannon is on the map if you havent' done so already. It's not a long drive and it's quicker to get to than Parley would be for you. Also, I can't emphasize this enough, it won't do you much good to work on techniques if you're fishing lakes that don't have much of a walleye bite. I'm not saying you can't do it, I'm just saying that if you want to learn to fish walleyes, go where the walleyes are. For walleyes I would pick Cannon over Marion, Prior, Spring, Orchard, Crystal, Fish, or anything in the Shakopee area. Good luck, I hope you get 'em figured out.

[Griggs]

Yeah sorry, I hadn't updated my profile. I now live in Shakopee. I realize its still not really far away, but I'd like a shorter drive if its going to be something I fish regularly (gas prices)

Maybe I'll just head to tonka. I dunno. Doesn't really seem like theres very good Walleye fishing in the metro. A lota lakes iwth Walleyes in them, just not many good ones.