Walleyes in transition?

It sure seems like the Rainy Lake walleyes are into an early summer transition. Well, at least some of them are. I say some because their are always walleyes to be had in shallow water on Rainy Lake! Don’t think you have to be a reef expert. Just over the last 2 days I spent nearly equal amounts of time fishing in water 5 feet or less and water deeper than 26 feet. If you are headed to Rainy Lake soon (Duluth Fish!) be prepared to be versatile.

Yesterday was a cloudy windy day and I could not resist thinking I could get some shallow water walleyes. That proved true but not in any sort of huge numbers. We covered a lot of water casting Castaic Baby Jerky J’s on 1/8oz heads along with Rapala Flat Raps. We also long lined light jigs in the same areas, but the plastics ruled the day. I did not run any light spinner rigs tipped with minnows and some days out here you should spin to win! Plenty of fish between 19 and 22 inches made for good fun. The day before was much brighter and vitually no wind. We spent the day looking at what I would call pre-summer areas. These would be more shoreline related or types of structure that are near shallow areas but yet have water deeper than 30 feet adjacent to them. We scored on a bunch of nice walleyes between 13 and 18 inches with a few biggies mixed in. Again, I would say decent fishing but not every cast type thing. There is always a timing factor and by that I mean it seems like the fish are feeding for brief periods of time. If you know the fish are there but you can’t get them to go, try getting back on them at a different time or under slightly different conditions. That alone can make for a HUGE difference.

Current areas are holding some fish right now as well.

Good Luck out there.

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Thanks for the great report Deron! Are the “hotter” times, the traditional morning/evening windows or more random and spread out through the day?

Great report Deron, I will be heading up there the 30th. I’m hoping the Walleyes are on the humps by then.

Deron,

Thanks for the report. I will be running around a lot checking shallow and deeper also. Yeah, crappies would be awesome but just gonna be ready for whatever I come across. How is that Kempton Channel area for walleye?

Thanks for the updates. I’m heading up on Saturday and will be up through Weds morning. I have to admit that the forecast is giving me a bit of heartburn. Hopefully the stormy weather rolls through quickly this weekend. Any tips for fishing the back side of the front? It might be difficult to make it out to the reefs on the east side if it stays windy. NOAA is showing gusts of 22 on Monday afternoon.

You won’t need to worry about fishing reefs. If it’s windy fish shallow or fish wind blown points or shoreline areas. The reef bite has been non existent.

I will be at Rainy Lake June 25 to July 1 and was wondering if anyone could share any suggestions about areas, depths, or baits to use. This is only the second time to be on the lake for me and last year being the first. Although I love to fish for smallmouth the other guys will be looking for walleye. We will be staying at Island View lodge and will be fishing the US side. Any suggestions of ideas would be appreciated. ( We do have boats )

Thanks,
Dropshotflipper

The Kempton Channel area can be very good for walleye and would be a good choice. Look for emerging weedlines or pitch jigs to the rocks and work them back to the boat. You will find fish there. The fish may be very close to the banks.

Big Werm,

The mornings are typically the best. The bite may last until noon on most days. Some days they will bite all day. That said there are still small windows during the day that will provide fast action…hard to predict! Late evenings right before dark can be excellent as well and you will find very few people around at that time.

Wayne, I would expect that there will be a reef bite going by the time you arrive at Rainy Lake. Just remember that there will still be fish available shallow during certain conditions and at dawn and dusk type time frames. There are times you can catch plenty of fish right off the back of your houseboat!

Dan,

You probably are already here, but I am going to complicate your search! I did get some nice fish on some reefs today. I suspect you may be able to target some deep fish on certain reefs. If you see fish you will get them. Often times the deep fish are small fish initially and the bigger ones will come shortly thereafter, but the fish I got today were dandies. Sorry for the report yesterday! Times…they are a changin’…

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Nice work Deron you really know that lake. Need to visit you this summer.

Deron, thanks for the reply. I vacation at Rainy in late May, around July 4th, and in mid August. Late May was for the first time this year and I found out the Canadian side is best in spring, so our group is planning on giving it a try next spring. Do you also guide their?

Howdy Bob! It sure was good to see ya last week! You know you are welcome anytime. Recognize this dude?

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Wayne,

The Canadian side of Rainy has some of the best drive to fishing for walleyes on the planet. I have not guided on the Canada side in the past, but…ya never know. I may be guiding there next year…we’ll see. I fish that side often just not a guide deal.

Deron that would be Hammy headed your way this Fri for a week camping with him. Hope the Hammy Triangle doesn’t strike we should hook up.

Deron,

Thanks for the update. I was able to read your message on my phone, but haven’t had good internet access to post a response.

The conditions were pretty challenging with all of the weather and wind but we made the best of it. We only landed a hand full of eyes and they were all pretty small. We caught one off of the submerged humps on the east side of dryweed island in about 25 ft of water. The rest were in shallow water ~5 to 10 ft near and over rocky shallows at various locations.

I was hoping for a little bit better action, but you can’t win them all! It was nice to be out on the lake. Time passes to quickly up there. I hope to be back soon.