Pool 4 Upper Mississippi River.
In spring and fall I would guess 75% or better of the anglers head to the dam. More specifically, from the bottom of the Y to the dam.
Why?
Because the fish migrate to the first barrier? Likely.
Because that’s where all the boats are? Makes sense.
Because that where someone took them the first time on the river. Some I ‘spose.
Yes there are a lot of fish at the dam, can’t argue that point. Ever notice when the spring reports start coming in we hear a lot of “they were all dinks”? Generally speaking most of those fish come from what the regulars call “the nursery” or the deep water scour hole. Those 8 to 12 inch fish are mostly tossed back only to be eagle and turtle food. It’s well documented by the MN DNR that saugers and walleyes seldom survive after being caught out of water over 25 feet deep. Even if they swim away nicely, they are doomed to die within three days.
But, I’m not hear to preach. Just to add an alternative coming from a non walleye (seldom) fishing guy’s point of view.
Yesterday I had the pleasure of tagging along with Johnny River Rat and his dad. They were fishing while I was nosing around the bottom with a Marcum LX-9. I will admit whether it’s walleyes, catfish or sturgeon I love watching fish in their world trying to figure out why fish of any species are in a certain location and not in others.
Yesterdays trip proved to me that fishing amunst the crowds is not the best option. We were all by ourselves with the closest boat being around a river mile away from us. We heard several reports of a tough bite. There were a few boats out at night that were catching fish.
After looking around at the dam we made the decision to fish else where is a less populated area. We dropped the camera down just down stream of the Y and found channel cats (guessing about 7 poundsish) and a Lake Sturgeon of good size. But not as many fish as we wanted to see so up came the MotorGuide and on to the next location.
Dropped the camera into about 17 feet of water and I was disappointing in what I saw. Nothing but sand, wood and rock. Using the trolling motor we move around the area and finally I spotted a walleye, then another and another and another. The bottom was sand and in one location a thick clam bed. It seemed that most of the fish were down stream of the clam bed but it was a good marker for us to get ready for the bite.
I should mention just before reaching the “hot spot” Old Man River Rat hooked a smaller fish while casting his blade bait. That would be the only small fish seen for the day we just didn’t know it at the time.
For the rest of the day from Noon :30 to 3 pm I might have seen 1 walleye that was near 15″ all the rest were larger with some true tanks showing up on the camera. I consider tanks over 5 pounds.
Generally speaking with a camera down the walleyes love being filmed but they get spooked too much to bite. I believe this was the case while we were out. You’ll be able to see the raised dorsal fin of many of the walleyes in the video I’m posting tonight.
Between Old Man River Rat’s pitching blade bait and Johnny River Rat’s vertical Ring Worm, they brought 3 fish to the boat along with too many “curse word, missed him” comments. I on the other hand caught well more then my limit on camera. 
My point here is to fish other areas then the “memories” or at least save one hour each time out to try another area. Yes it does help to have a camera to see if the fish you’re seeing on the graph are your targeted species or if there are any fish below at all.
The saying 90% of the fish are in 10% of the water is proven when using a camera.
With the air temps in the 40’s, it was a great day to be back out on the river…it’s been too long!
Here’s a shot of Johnny River Rat with a couple of the catch. The sauger is 17.5″
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