Iowa River Walleye

Nothing too great to post. The bite does seem to slowly be picking up after the flooding this year. Over the course of late last week through this week, we have seen the river finally reach a fishable level at 14 feet and I have been fishing the Iowa River every night with my buddies Josh Hanson and Jason Bock. The amount of small shad in the river is tremendous! Small three inch shad are all over that river, giving game fish a nice forage base but also making the bite a little tough being there is so much available to the fish right now. The roughies are thick, but get through them and you’ll find the game fish. So far, the stripers, walleyes, and crappies seem to be having a fairly decent bite going- nothing super but it is getting more steady every night. For bait, I’ve been throwing either a 1/16th oz head and a slider or an 1/8th oz head and a 5 inch Kalins lunker grub- electric blue and purples are still hot. Last night we ended up with 4 decent walleyes, some nice stripers, oh, and a few channels. I know this is nothing too hot to post, but I figure if there are any others here in the Cedar Rapids/Iowa City corridor looking for some fishing, I would say that the bite will be getting better once the river reaches around 12 feet. Get your polls ready, and get out and fish- it’s been long overdue! Good luck to all and let me know if any IDO’ers have been doing anything different or have a success story or two.