It's been a great start to 2015. I haven't been on the Great Lakes but I've been on some great walleye waters. I've been wearing off the trailer tires and dragging friends and family all over.
Mississippi River in the spring we caught a bunch.
Here are 4 in the 25"-26" range I caught/released in March. B-Fishn Moxy's and B-Fishn paddle tails.
I upgraded electronics this year. I stripped out my old Gen I Lowrance HDS units and sold them on Ebay and replaced with a single Gen III Lowrance HDS 9" with CHIRP sonar and side imaging and structure scan. I had a couple Gen 1s mounted before. This one is so much clearer and faster. The touch screen is great. Also, Lowrance added the menu buttons back to the unit so you can work it with gloves on. Gen II didn't have the buttons which they got some flack about.
SB - I was thinking about what you said with regard to using the trolling motor more (I troll leadcore quite a bit in July/August) and I was getting some feedback/static in my sonar when I'd run the trolling motor. It was really irritating. It was hard to read the marks and I had to rely on my structure scan which isn't as ideal for marks up in the water column. I finally figured it out. When the trolling motor is running it is sending noise through the 3 bank battery charger over to the cell that runs my electronics. When I disconnect it from the charger... it works perfect. I'll be trolling with my trolling motor more now. Your comment about that got under my skin because I knew you were right about using the trolling motor more. I thought maybe the wires needed to be shielded better, or something. Anyway I figured it out and now the walleyes are kind of screwed
or something.
New batteries. Not the expensive gel cells but they are working great.
Fished MN "opener" on Whiteface Reservior in MN -- hadn't fished there before. We caught crappies but I didn't take any pics of them. Water was down 4ft.
My cousin from FL flew up and we fished Leech Lake and Rainy Lake. He boated this 26" -- I didn't ask but I'm certain it's his biggest walleye. He catches a lot of big fish in the ocean but he's originally from MN so it was kind of a big deal to catch a nice walleye. Doesn't get to do it much. He's the one that flew up a couple years ago to deer hunt. He stayed patient and shot a nice 8pt buck.
Leech Lake, MN - June - Released
Rainy Lake, MN - June
Rainy Lake, MN - June
Took a 4 day trip to Devil's Lake, ND... We caught a bunch of eater walleyes and we brought 30 of those home. Caught some really nice northerns too. I brought some back some pike to pickle. Here's a 40" pike my pheasant hunting buddy Jon caught. Said it was his biggest fish ever. I love when that happens in my boat.
Devil's Lake, ND - June - Released
The bite is on fire on my favorite lake Mille Lacs. Everyone hates Mille Lacs now except me. It's supposedly at a 40 year low for walleyes and you can only keep one fish 19" to 21" but I don't care. They are popping if you can find them. And it's easy to find them with good electronics. We slip bobber with the big motor running or trolling motor "power corking." If there's wind, I drift through schools with the drift sock deployed... using a Lindy Rig or pulling Slow Death rigs. I will start running leadcore in the next couple weeks. Depends if the fish start suspending more.
Here's the only pic of my boat. It's a 19.5 deep V -- high gunwales. Kids like that. I take it in big waves all the time. It was all decked out with downriggers, a mast for the boards, etc. etc. when I bought it. ... I bought it off a guy that only trolled on the Great Lakes. I stripped all that stuff off. For walleyes, I prefer leadcore. It presents more naturally if your speed control isn't perfect. The leadcore has no stretch so I put on 10 yards of of cheap 10 pound "XT" mono to get better hookups.
24" corking active fish in flat calm and staying on them with the trolling motor and spot lock
25.5" lindy rig - bottom bouncer, braided line, 7ft fluro leader and a small hook with leech.
20" Smallie (it's a world class smallmouth fishery) -- swimming a white Moxy.
Here's a buddy with like a 16-17" smallie - one of his biggest he said.
Boat traffic is down 70% on Mille Lacs
I'm running to Mille Lacs this weekend probably. I'll power cork (I know that sounds stupid, but that's what it's called here) if it's calm or run live bait rigs (lindy or slow death) and maybe some spinners/blades. I will bring the leadcore rods and Salmo Hornets and SR5, JSR5, Scatter Raps, and Smash Shads. I'm sure I'll do some trolling if I find them suspended in open water off the sides of mud flats.
This is power corking and it is a great way to pluck fish feeding in bug hatches as well as how Jon Thielen is doing it with active fish just off bottom. I caught a bunch last weekend doing this. Until the wind picked back up and then we went live bait rigging again.
[bbvideo=425,350]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9jMcOpiS8g[/bbvideo]
Here's my little guy at 9 months. His sister did that to his hair.
Threw in this pic I ran across online... for good measure.