We had the opportunity to fish Lake St Joe one day this week for some exceptional Walleye fishing. Since a non-resident tag is required to fish it we were lucky enough to secure tags with one of 4 camps on the 80 mile long lake. A guide was also in order considering the danger navigating a mine field of shallow underwater rocks and also the distance we traveled over open water.
The Walleyes were primarily in shallow water (4 to 8 FOW) sand bottom areas adjacent to deeper water. The guide commented this pattern would hold until later in the Summer when they move to the deeper humps and mid lake structure. It only took a couple spots of his “milk run” until we found the mother load. We also implemented the 5 min rule; where if we didn’t catch anything in 5 min or less we moved on.
I have fished Walleyes in multiple Canadian provinces including fly-outs, drive to’s, and even portage lakes…Lake St. Joe ranks right up there with the best of the best Walleye fishing in Canada. It may not have the numbers of trophy 28″ to 30″ fish found in lac Seul or more Southern Canadian Walleye waters but for mind boggling numbers of 20″ to 24″ fish easy to catch it may be tough to beat. Once we found active fish doubles, triples, and quadruples were pretty common throughout the day. I didn’t have the fish counter going but I couldn’t imagine what it would have read at the end of the day; more catching than fishing really. Our top bait was a white 3″ twister tail. No live bait needed.
We even had a Canadian shore lunch mid way through the day. Nothing better than fresh Walleye in the Canadian wilderness. The highlight of the day was my 10 yo nephew catching his PB 27″ Walleye. For sure I will be back…Hopefully, later in the Summer to try some mid lake structure fishing.
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