Ever since Rootski posted on 10/16 that the fall plastic bite was here, I have been fortunate enough to be out on the river 2-4 times every week learning more about the night bite.
As the water temps have fallen from the low 50’s to the 45-46 degree range, the bite has consistently gotten better. I figure that I would rely upon my normal method that worked well for me last year… Moxies and Paddletails, with 1/16th-1/8oz jigs casted at various angles to the wing dams. Yep, the fish liked this presentation still, go figure.
As the flow seems slower at this time of year compared to last and again dropped last night, I have noticed/stumbled onto a new revelation. Typically, I would position the boat in more close proximity to the WD, say maybe in 8FOW and do my fan casting until I find out what they exactly want, what color, what weight, what retrieve speed, what angle the bait should swing across the WD, etc.
However, this would only pick up the fish that I would think were more actively feeding/chasing bait in the shallower water close/on the WD. When a fish was caught and the boat gets out of position and slips into deeper water, say the 10-13fow, I would notice numerous, larger fish positioned outside/around the WD and never really paid attention to them thinking, ‘they will come up/near the WD and feed at some point in time, we will just keep casting and wait it out’. I also realized this… when one of us would fish with a 1/16thoz jig and the other a 1/8oz jig, I noticed a pattern developing – the 1/16oz took more fish in the shallower water and the 1/80z more fish in deeper water, which seems obvious. However, when the boat got out of position and slipped into deeper water, I was beginning to pick up fish in 10-13FOW!
Either one of two things I think is happening, and likely both. Casting up into shallow water, some eyes will trail the bait out into deeper water all the way back to the boat and strike as the bait ascends in the final 15-20 feet of the retrieve and/or in the final half of the retrieve, slowing the retrieve down to get the jig deeper in the water column, fish in the deeper water were actually active fish and coming up and biting.
As I started focusing on this deeper water with this slower flow, I tried different weights, casting straight up river, etc trying to get these deeper fish to strike, especially when the fish in shallow water slowed down and maybe got ‘burnt out’. As I spend more time out in the 10-13fow, I noticed that the bigger fish on the bottom would at times come up off the bottom 2-3 feet and would begin to feed on the smaller (shad?) fish in the area. Working this deeper water with a slightly heavier jig, 1/8oz-3/15oz jig and slower retrieve has picked up a few extra fish, which, as the HDS printed, were bigger walleyes.
Most guys likely already do fish this water column as well, but it is a first for me, stumbled upon by accident and trial and error….thought I’d share.
From mid-week last week until last night, the fishing has seemed to slow a bit as the water temps kind of stabilized and the flow is slow(er), the fish are a bit more widely spread out. Last night was the bite of the 16″-20″ers. We got about 10 of those and only a few of the bigger 20-25″ with a 25″er being the biggest, caught of course at 1:40am as we were packing up. The bite seems to be the best after 11:00pm. Over the past week, I have gotten lucky and landed some of the biggest this year with a two 26.75″ers taken and numerous in the 23-25″ range. The best part of it all is taking some guys out from church that have only caught one walleye in their life to never catching a big fish an watch the excitement of them catching beautiful, big walleyes!
Bingo! 
