Cranks for Walleye

Nearly all the walleye fishing I’ve ever done has been with live bait. Even now, I don’t get much luck when I throw cranks. I know people like trollin with them… but how do you work them when casting? What is everyone’s favorite way to fish crankbaits, and which are the most productive? Any advice would be helpful. Thanks

My fave’s are

Walleye Divers
Shad Raps
Grappler Shads
Wiggle Worts

Good question. Fishing a crank bait the right way isn’t as easy as most guys think it is……….nor does it have to be that hard. I just use a steady retreive when bringing the crank back to the boat with short pauses at times when the bait really starts to dig in to rock. The key is how you work the bait through the structure you are fishing. I like to try and hit bottom on my cast when fishing the river be it a wing dam or rip rap. Stoping your retreive for a short moment will entice fish to strike when the bait starts to float back up out of the rocks.

RS Shad Raps, jointed Shad Raps and wally divers make up most of my crank bait casting arsenal.

Ditto on the retreive that Dustin talked about.

My fav’s are the Wally Diver and the Wally Minnow, also Shad Raps and jointed Shad Raps.

Jointed shad raps
Shad raps
Rebel deep craw
Hot n tot-metal lip or Daves winning streak,the original tot

I use alot of jointed #4 shad raps casting the shallow water on our part of the Cedar River in IA. For trolling I move to a #5 or larger. Don’t overlook the Rebel Deep Craw. It has put alot of eyes in my boat both at home and on the Miss………..B

Dustin —

I’m waiting on your next video “Catchin’ with Cranks” !!

I bought a copy of your plastics video the other week and loved the no no-nsense instruction. Better than any in-fisherman videos or alike. Instead of watching someone catch fish James and yourself actually show the baits and techniques. Awesome job.

jj

Ditto with the other guys favorities. But in my area, especially Little Bay de Noc and Green Bay, ThunderSticks, Rogues, and Bomber Long A Minnows reign supreme for long line trollers and 3 ways. I think the type the forage base may determine the effective lure size/shape.

I do a lot of my casting with lipless cranks. Just let them drop to bottom and bring them in with pauses.

Gator Hunter

Shad raps, Wally Divers and Husky Jerks are my favorites during the summer months.
Early season river fishing, especially when fishing at night while wading the river is a different story:
#11 Floating rapalas and #10 Husky Jerks have far and away out fished everything else at night during pre-spawn on rivers.
JWB

I spend a good portion of my Pool 2 warmer water periods throwing cranks to the wing dams and rip rap shorelines.
I most cases I like the Bomber Model 6A crank. THis is a shorter fat body crank that has alot of vibration to it and has an uncanny way of walking through the rocks when presented with a real and pause when rock contact is made like Dustin mentioned. This will catch you a lot of fish when oresented this way. Some of my favorite colorson the river are the chartrueses and firetiger for starters and have a good supply of chromes on hand as well as a offset.

Hope this helps you out!

What are your opinions on “noise” cranks??? Rogues and Mann’s Minus series. The body shapes and actions are the same as the stated favorites and I would think the noise of the favorites digging into the rocks and bottom would be similiar to the rattle of these noise lures. Wouldn’t this help attract a responses or two. I know from experience that pike love the Mann’s series and always wanted to try them out on shallow staged ‘eyes’, but fishing with James and Dustin I never get around to it.

After this post and the one by Steve about the new Grappler size I will be afraid to drive past a Grander Mtn or Bass Pro. There goes the next trip money. LOL. But I gusess it is true “Lure catch more fisherman than fish”.

Eagerly awaiting the opinions of the “experts”.

SKPIKE – Roger Budny

I like rattles….ever since I was a baby i liked rattles

Roger,

Rattles are a good attribute in a crank during the summer months with the dirtier water. A guy needs all the attractant help he can get. All of the cranks I listed have rattles in them.

After seeing a few other post it made me relize I forgot list the bombers as well . They have been good cranks for me on both smallies and eyes.

The majority of the cranks I use on the river and mille lacs have rattles. some very large and loud. Others much smaller and a bit more subdued in volume. Attention needs to be paid to fish activity level to match the right crankbait to the fish. In the heat of the summer, a 3/8 ounce rattle tot trolled at high speeds is a killer on the lake. Use that same plug in the early spring and you’ll go hungry. Typically an angler will see a better response to larger, slnder profile crankbaits in cooler water and a noticeable switch in preference towards the shad body styles (shorter and deeper) as the waters warm and fish activity levels increase. As such, that short and squat Manns crankbait might be a killer in the summer on wingies but likely wouldn’t fare too well pre-spawn when the fish usually repond positively to a rogue, floating rap or husky jerk… all long and slender baits with a subtle action.

I agree with the James comments on noisy lures. One thing that has always bothered me about suspending lures is that they all appear to have a rattle. Noise is not always a good thing. When fishing prespawn walleyes at night on the rivers, some nights they will not touch a Husky Jerk. But throw in a modified neutral bouyant #11 rapala, and the action can heat up quickly. The difference on some nights can be hard to believe. Even when it is pitch black or windy or better yet, in snow. Does anyone know of a company that makes a neutral bouyant stick bait without rattles?
JWB

JWB

I’m not aware of a suspending crank w/o rattles. A few suspendots or some lead wire wrapped around the trebles will quickly get done what needs to be done… but from the sounds of things, you know all about doctoring lures for night time performance.

One last little tidbit about suspending baits. There’s lots of choices out there and quite a bit of room for experimenting. If I take 10 #12 husky jerks out on the water, fresh from the packages, I’ll get 8 or so that track “straight and true.” Of those 8, there will be a couple that suspend poorly and are more or less worthless. Suspending issues include slowly sinking, floating or coming to rest tail up or head down… all of which really throw off the presentation.

Now, of the half dozen or so that track straight when trolled & suspend correctly, only a very small number have a VERY tight side to side wobble and the rest will run straight but have an exaggerated “kick” and wide swings of the tail. These lures, the hard throbbers, need more speed and more forceful rod twitches and pumps to get those fine little enticing twitches and pauses that the walleyes love after dark on Mille Lacs Lake. The short of my point here is that a person really needs to pay attention to the individual characteristics of the lures being used. Just because it’s fresh out of the box and the “right” pattern or size doesn’t mean its guaranteed to work properly for the application at hand. Some companies like Rapala do a pretty good job with quality control with their biats and yet I still see a pretty good number of “duds” that couldn’t be used to catch a cold. And when you find a really good one… its worth its weight in gold! Until a pike EATS it that is.

I make it a habit of always checking and tuning a bait before it gets cast out or put out on a trolling line.
Just the same, some of my Husky Jerks are full of teeth marks. Some other ones, which were probably bought about the same time, don’t have a scratch on em.
Some good pointers in there James.
Thanks, JWB

I agree 100% with Jame’s above post about the noise and rattles. I see the exact same conditions on Pool 2 when I am pitching cranks to the wingdams in the summer time, but once water temps dip below that 50 degree mark, the cranks without rattle and more subtle actions get the nod hands down. The fish sense the cooling water and seem to really favor the more subtle actions over the vibrant wobbles.

James comments on the differences from one crankbait to the next is something that I have had the opportunity to experience over many years of open water crank pulling. How can 1 or 2 out of 10 be that good and the others not be as productive or seem non-producable at times? This is something that continues to baffle most all anglers at one point in time. On a typical day of trolling, I may start out trolling all one color and the same brand and size to determine my producer of that group. Seems as though a odd approach, but this has proven day in and day out as a way to separate the men from the boys sort of speak. I will not do this on tourney day or when I am guiding, however the little effort put into this excercise may help you down the road. Subtle differences may be seen at the boatside while tuning your crankbaits, but little things such as some rattles being lodged in their chambers, little imperfections in the mold, improper curing times on the mold can all lead to lures that may have little imperfections that could lead to a chance of that lure being less than perfection. Does this mean that these lures will not catch fish? Absolutely not, some may have an slight different action that may excel during certain conditions while other have a different time and place for their action!

I sense an article of this issue for the future of all our findings?

Great info guys.

The following are some past posts and entries in my WEb pages on the subject. One of the two biggest changes have been the addition of Rattlintrappie type lures and two of Taylor tackles new cranks, a shallow diver and a mid depth diver. As guide customers can attest the last two caught most of my late summer thru late fall Walleye, and Bass. And at $2.99 they are quite a bargin. They are my main sponsor, but I wouldn’t use them if they weren’t meeting or exceeding the other options…my guide business depends on it. For some reason last year Fire tiger beat all other colors.(higher dirtier water????) In previous years chrome,Gold/black, perch, and crayfish patterns seemed as strong or stronger than FT, but last year from JUne on it was no contest.

CASTING THE ROCKS(Bass,Walleye,Northern)

This is a huge subject, but I will just tell you what we do and how we do it. Our go to lure for shallow rocks is any style of rattlin rap…trap, etc. including generics. This primarily a bass technique,(not anymore..I use it a ton for Walleye also) and this is how we have been getting our smallmouth and largemouth right next to each other IN THE MAIN CHANNEL. It is amazingly productive and amazingly hard on baits.(plan to lose 10-15 a day). Captain Hook’s in Genoa Wisconsin has a line of everyday $2.99 trap type lures. Every color they carry is productive, but I prefer chrome, and also crayfish patterns(they have three). Many people have asked on websites for details so I have reserved the details for those who visit this site. Anywhere on the Mississippi channel; wingdams,riprap shorelines, and front sections of backwaters you will find rocks. The all time most productive spots are the south end of closing dams that have rocks closest to the shore exposed with current on them. The casting is pretty simple. We use spincasters and aim about three feet upstream from where the rocks are exposed, at a 45 degre angle to the south. Your goal is to hook up with any fish right on the point or at angle just behind the end of the exposed rocks. I still haven’t found one that doesn’t hold some fish. It only takes a cast or two to see if they are there right then and minnows spraying tells you right away if the fish are actively feeding. Your secondary casts should be to the face of the above water section just in front of the exposed rocks, and third, (if you can get to the back side of the closing dam),along the backside of the same exposed rocks. I guess the exposed rocks part just comes as part and parcel with shallow rocks so it is more of a quick indicator than anything else. You will notice as water rises and drops these locations actually appear and disappear, but we find a much better percentage of fish on them when they have rocks showing. If you use this technique you will find that you will very quickly find out what water level is best at each individual location, both for fishing and not losing cranks. We have some that you grab the fish in 4 inches of water and some where 1 1/2 feet is better. Like I have said before on this site it is all about “TIME ON THE WATER”.

WORKING THE WINGDAMS- PERPINDICULAR PASSES

I FOLLOW A PRETTY SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO WORKING WING DAMS. FIRST I PICK THE ONES I WANT TO FISH. FOR THE PURPOSE OF THIS ARTICLE I WILL ASSUME I HAVE NEVER SEEN OR FISHED THE WING DAM BEFORE. I HARDLY EVER FISH WING DAMS THAT DON’T SHOW A LARGE WATER DISTURBANCE ON THE TOP. FOR WHAT EVER REASON THESE DAMS SEEN TO HAVE THE RIGHT CURRENT FLOW,UNDER WATER STRUCTURE AND DEPTH RANGE TO BE PRODUCTIVE. AFTER FINDING THE CORRECT WING DAM AND FLOATING OVER WITH THE MOTOR UP A COUPLE OF TIMES TO FIND OUT SEVERAL DIFFERENT DEPTHS I FOLLOW THE FOLLOWING STEPS TILL SOMETHING WORKS. #1 IF THE DEPTH ALLOWS I WILL MAKE 5-7 UPSTREAM AND DOWNSTREAM TROLLING RUNS IN 3-7 FEET OF WATER USUALLY USING SHAD RAPS OR LITTLE WALLEYE DIVERS. SOMEDAYS IF YOU JUST DID THESE TWO STEPS YOU WOULD FILL YOUR LIVE WELL TO OVERFLOWING.THE NEXT COUPLE PARAGRAPHS IS A POST ON THIS SUBJECT THAT I AUTHORED…..

As the water and flow has pretty much continued its downward spiral for 1 1/2 monthes, with a little up swing for 5 days about a week ago the walleyes moves have been very predictable. The Eyes on nine have moved from inside to middle to outer third of wingdams.(Ofcource there are always exceptions.) Walleyes have disappeared from the very shallow wing dams(under 2 feet), and have started showing up on wing dams that seemed to be too deep earlier in the year. Each year I try to concentrate on one type of fishing and from last fall till now it has been mostly picking apart wing dams with long line and casting cranks. (25% casting-75% or more long lining.) Let me tell you right now if you are not willing to ding the prop, skip the long lining!! Earlier in the year I had good success pulling the front and rear lips and the drop in front. For almost 3 weeks now the bread and butter,(size and numbers), have come from doing lawnmower swaths perpendicular across the top of the wing dam. In the last three weeks I have caught more walleye than I normally do all summer (on the Mississippi), and the size has been much more constant in the mid and upper 20s. Even more suprising is the fact that midday has been equal to or better,(much better last week and a half), than early morning or evening. This has been happening since mid June. On Friday about 3 P.M. two friends of mine(actually the two guys who taught me to jig) were casting with cranks on one of my favorite wing dams and as I approached and pulled the flats above the dam, they moved on to the next one. They had been casting parrellel to the dam in the middle and in towards shore. As they drove away down the river I turned and did a 90% run across the dam they had just left. The first pass was 28″ sheeba(walleye) and the second a 10# plus cat. I was only about fifty feet from where they had parked, but they casted towards shore. They were casting 1 to 2 feet of water and above and below and I was pulling over 4 to 6 feet of water and caught the fish right on top. I mention that because 3 to 5 feet of water has worked best most of the summer. I keep trying shallower(mostly casting), both on wing dams that are all shallow and on the shallow end of other dams. Even when the insides were working the water was about this depth. THE LAWNMOWER SWATH THING IS A VERY GOOD DISCRIPTION OF HOW I APPROACH NEW WING DAMS. ON THAT PARTICULAR WING DAM UNTIL I MAKE A GOOD NUMBER OF PASSES I DON’T KNOW A LOT OF THINGS ABOUT IT FOR EXAMPLE: IS IT BROAD OR POINTED, HOW SCRAGGY AND SNAGGY, IS IT ON TOP, WHERE EXAXTLY IS MY TARGET DEPTH, ARE THERE ANY HOLES, DENTS, POCKETS,(IMPORTANT SINCE WE ARE OFTEN LOOKING FOR SOME UNIQUE CHANGES THAT MIGHT HOLD FISH, THE INFAMOUS SPOT ON A SPOT), WHERE DOES THE SHALLOW END AND DROP INTO DEEPER WATER, AND OFCOURCE WHERE AM I GETTING MY BITES. AS YOU CAN SEE I’M LOOKING FOR SO MUCH INFO THAT PROBABLY ACTUALLY WON’T BE USED MUCH TODAY ,BUT BUILDS UP MY SO CALLED DATABASE ON THAT WIND DAM. BECAUSE OF THE IMPORTANCE AND COMPLEXITY OF WORKING THE WING DAMS I AM ONLY COVERING ONE AT A TIME-NEXT STEP…..CASTING THE WINGDAMS

WORKING THE DAMS – CASTING
Casting wing Dams is actually pretty straight forward. The first thing I’m always trying to determine is where the fish are on a particular wingdam. Two factors play a big part in this . The flow on the wing dam, and the general structure and shape. Remember under the first section above I mentioned floating over the dams to get a better look on your fish finder, with regards to dents, cups, holes, how the end drops off, in the wing dam. This is where I really start using this info. In the Perpindicular passes mentioned above, my passes were determined by where the depth was right for both the boat and the cranks being used, (obviously if it is to shallow to boat over I couldn’t fish that part of the Dam), . Now with casting I have more options. Flow is only critical when it is either higher, or lower than normal. In general, low flow-fish move towards the channel end of the wing dam, high flow – fish stay put or move nearer to the shore end of the wingdam. So I start my casting, in the approximate, depth, location I expect to find the fish at. If your at a loss here as to where to start, just start on one end and work your way to the other. I actually usualy park casting distance in front of the wing dam, in about the middle and fan cast in both directions, and keep moving left and or right till I either have found the fish, or am confident I have covered it well enough . You just heard me say I anchored in front and this is my first step. Again like the swaths I was cutting with the boat moving I am gonna cast pretty much perpindicular. It is somewhat accepted that actively feeding walleye will be on the front or the top of the wing dam. Again here there is no 100%, but it is usually the case. After I have done my 90 degree cast, if I haven’t located the fish I will now start casting more parralell to the front face trying to cover the front lip, and any structure that is off the face of the dam, ie…trees, rock piles, etc. For whatever reason, both of these first two types of casting hardly ever work on the same wing dam on the same day. Next where the depth and structure of the wingdams allow, I’m gonna anchor on top of the dam and and cast pretty much in every direction trying again to cover the top completely. May successful wingdam fishermen only do this one, especially in early morning and late evening, as sunset draws near. You will notice here I didn’t mention what I was casting since I usually follow this pattern with cranks, light jigs, dubuque rigs, spinnerbaits, just about anything I cast. The huge percentage of the time I am throwing cranks as explained in the next section “Low Water Walleyes”

Low Water Walleyes – One of my posts on Working wing dams I’m writing a book here to have others who use this technique to compare notes and make additions and suggestions. Have some of you been seeing the same patterns , in particular the Midday bite??? Actually I am making overlapping passes. On pool nine on the dams I’m working, weeds aren’t much of a factor as far as I can tell, other than you will be cleaning them off all the time. I usually start the farthest towards shore I can go with out replacing a propeller and then jump to the outside end and work back to that spot. Don’t hesitate to drift over a new dam a few times to see how deep it really is. Pulling the cranks upstream seems best, but downstream works too. Don’t forget to pull the drop just in front of the wing dam and the tailwater right behind. In addition to dings in the prop when you get a little too shallow , you will loose a lot of cranks too. Don’t be afraid,(if depth allows ) to float back to the the lure, and pull it loose from right above. The fish don’t seem to mind a bit. You are going to find out right away which wing dams and fish like this technique. I catch ninety percent of my fish on three wing dams, but I fish about 8 to 10 a day just to make sure the best ones aren’t changing. I’m using a combination of walleye divers, bomber long a’s, and #5 shad rap RS. These are banging pretty hard, and aren’t far behind the boat. I realized a couple of years ago that it is possible to catch a walleye on almost any rig right under the prop wash. For the front and the tailwaters I run parrellel and with more line out. It appears that most aggresively feeding fish are on top or on the front lip, because that is where almost all of them have come from in the last 2 weeks, (actually last month and a half). I also sometimes will 45 degree across the top from outside to inside and you will snag and loose more cranks this way, but somedays it’s all that works. Over 75% of the time I’m just cutting the perpedicular swaths and basically giving away the front hole and the tailwater. Even at Pepin about a month ago we set our lines at the depth of the humps and didn’t continually adjust for deeper streches. It worked and won the tourney for us. I noticed in the middle of 1999 that fish seem very often when feeding to suspend at the depth of the stucture they are feeding on even when they are not right on the structure, ( like at Castle rock, Petenwell, Green bay, Winnebago), and I’m kind of betting on it everywhere now. Ofcourse you always try the other possiblilities to make sure your not missing easy fish. Try it and tell me what you see.

Wingdam Crankbait Casters,

When I cast cranks like Walleye Divers, Bombers and Shap Raps RS perendicular to the windams, I typically can get these styles to bang the rocks for a little while but then it seems like I quickly loose contact with the rocks. If I cast parallel to the wingdam I can maintain contact a little longer. However in either case I don’t feel like I’m fishing the bottom half of the upstream face very effectively nor am I able to reach the base of the wingdam where if meets the floor of the river. It is in this location that I do pretty good some days trolling heavy jigs and Dubuque rigs. Based on the fact that you guys are using similar style cranks, I’d assume you have the same problem. Don’t you worry about fishing the lower half of the wingdams? I know most people believe the most active fish are on the top of the wingdam or the front lip, but what about all those fish laying at the base of wingdam that would hit a crank if it came wiggling by. Would you choose to throw a very deep diving crank like a Deep Down Rattlin Fat Rap or something similar or do you just go after the most active fish and forget the more nuetral ones at the base.

This makes me wonder if I’m fishing under a lot of the most active fish when I’m trolling heavy Dubuque rigs at the upstream base of the wingdams.

Any thought or comments?

Thanks,

Boone

I go to the super deep divers, designed to hit 15′ – 20′ deep on a cast, like the down deep rattlin fat raps to get to the base of the wingies and even out on the flat in front of the dams. The #5 down deeps are the best for this application but they’ve long since been discontinued. The #7’s are still available.

I read through this post with deep interest but had to wait till the end to see my favorites mentioned – The old down deep rattlin fat raps. I almost exclusively use the rattlin fat raps for casting and believe they are still one of the best casting cranks ever made. However, don’t write them off as unavailable – there were millions made and they are available on ebay any time. I own a couple hundred of them and have no problem keeping my stock up on them. They can usually be had for $5 or less a piece (during busy season) and can be had considerably cheaper if you find them improperly listed or buried with other stuff. Plus never be afraid to email the seller when you win an auction and let them know you are interested in more. About a year ago, I bought 3 on an ebay auction and found out the seller had 4 dozen more – bought them all before he had the chance to start another auction!

And I thought I had a secret going! I like to anchor out on the end of the wing, upstream slightly, and cast the Down Deep Rattlin’ Fat Raps parrallel to the dam and above it, then rip it across the front face. Pick up a lot of reaction strikes from what I presume are less active fish on the lower part of the face and the scoure hole in front of the dam. I then move up stream quietly and begin casting Wally Divers, Shad Raps and the like to the upper portion perpendicularly. I bought about 75 of the fat raps on a 1.99 close out sale when they were “discontinued”. Thought they might be good for something, and stumbled into an excellent presentation!

Great thread!

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