Got a chance to take a day off on Wednesday the 1st and head west to Devils Lake for the day.
We left around 8:30 am, despite a 25 MPH NW wind, we decided that even if we couldn’t get to some of my favorite spots that at least it was nice to get onto the water again. Because of the wind direction we decided that it would be best to put in at Black Tiger Bay. After getting set up we decided to try trolling a road bed with spinners. This looked interesting as the land slowed the wind right near the edge of the road and it was fairly easy to control the boat. We were able to pick up a couple of 14″ eyes doing this. After a good go at it, we swithced to trolling cranks along a weed edge in about 13 FOW. The sonar showed there were fish in the area, but only managed to put one eye in the boat at close to 14″. After a bit, we decided that it was time to just tie up in the trees and put a couple of slip bobbers out and cast into the trees/weed edge for the rest of our trip. We set up into a spot I have fished before that has an opening in the trees about 75 feet across all the way to shore, a solid weed line about 30 feet from shore and then 10 FOW where we tie up. This spot gives a lot of casting room and nice areas to cast into for both people in the boat.
While fishing here we managed to catch a couple of smaller eyes on bobbers (14″) and then a 20″ and 24″ walleye that I caught pitching cranks into the weed edge. It was a blast catching both of those fish as they just nailed the lure and took off!!
We also caught some whitebass on the cranks that was fun as well, the biggest was 17″ and took my crank at boat side (where we could see it) and took off.
All in all it was a fun day despite not being able to go to far b/c of the high winds. All fish were released to be caught another time. (Now I am heading out again on Sat and am thinking I might have to keep a couple for the pan again!!)
Anyways, For anyone thinking of making a trip to Devils Lake in the near future, it is a great fishery, and it pretty rare to get completely skunked!!
