Had a chance to get out for a few hours late Monday afternoon. I decided before I left that I wanted to spend some time casting crank baits and maybe pull some crawler harnesses around. Probably would have done better trolling, but decided to give some other tactics a go. Hit a 4 to 8 foot flat adjacent to a deep hole where I have been getting fish lately. The wind was blowing up into the shallows so I figured there should be some walleyes around.
I rigged up a crawler on a lindy rig and dragged it through the deeper water as I worked the shallows with a #7 shad rap RS. The crawler managed a white bass. My first walleye of the day went 24.5 inches, followed a few casts later by a 22 inch walleye. At that point the wind started to blow harder and the direction changed some so I switched over to pulling crawler harnesses on bottom bouncers. Right off the bat I boated a nice fat 17 inch sauger. After I lost 5 spinner rigs to the snags, I was about ready to switch gears again when I nailed a 21″ walleye. Those were my only two fish on crawlers.
For the last hour or so I went to trolling shad raps in some previously productive water but couldn’t coax anything over about 14 inches. I did manage both a 6 inch walleye and a 6 inch sauger on a #7 jointed shad rap.
All in all a great day to be out with warm temps and bright sun. Was much better than doing the work around the house I should have been doing. Here is a picture of the 24.5″ fish, though it was taken with my phone so it isn’t a very good picture. Best I could do by myself with a phone.
