Lake Wisconsin Walleye Fishing, 6/9 thru 6/12

Walleye and Sauger fishing on Lake Wisconsin kept getting tougher and tougher as each day of the weekend passed. Cold east/northeast winds took air and water temperatures on a slow and steady decline and the hot bite of the past few weeks went right down the tubes with the dropping water temperatures.

Although the numbers of legal fish were down considerably, my nephew Dan did managed to catch this nice 25" saugeye on Saturday, June 10nth.

Check out my report for the rest of the story.

Friday, 6-9-06

Dale and Judy Boetzel joined me for a day of walleye and sauger fishing on Lake Wisconsin today. It was a little chilly at 5:30am this morning and it seemed to effect the mood of the fish in the early morning hours.

The cold air temperatures from the night before dropped the surface water temperature from a high of 76 last week down to 73.5 out in the main lake today. On top of that, we had a chilly east/northeast wind blowing at 10-15mph.

Not the best conditions for walleye fishing in June, but by 9:30am, the bite started to pick up a little. We did not hammer them by any means, more like one here and one there. Just steady enough, that every time someone took their eye off one of the rods, a fish would hit.

A mad scramble would soon occur when Dale or Judy realized they just got bit and sometimes, if they were lucky, the fish was still there.

Our rigs did not change any from the past few weeks. Crawler rigs fished in 12-16′ of water. Same program that I’ve been using for the past two weeks.

Dale and Judy ended up catching 18 walleyes and saugers of which nine were legal. I believe they took home five or six. They also caught five smallies, 1 big white bass and at least a dozen sheepshead. All in all, it ended up being a pretty good day, despite the chilly start.

I had a great time fishing with you Dale and Judy! Take care and hope to see you guys up here again soon.

Saturday, 6-10-06

Today I enjoyed a fishing trip with my younger brother Gerard and his business associate Bob Sagmoen. Bob is not and unfamiliar face in my boat. This would be his second trip and he was hoping to have a repeat performance of his trip from last year when he caught a very nice 25" walleye. The third person in the boat was my nephew Dan who’s been hoping to go walleye fishing with us for awhile now.

Well if yesterday morning was a bit chilly, then this morning was down right cold. Damn, this is June 10nth! It’s suppose to be nice and warm by now. Last week we were suffering in 90 degree heat by high noon and today, we’re wrapped in rain gear as much to protect us against the cold east/northeast wind as we were trying to stay dry from the light rain hitting us as we made our way out into the main lake.

Surface water temperatures dropped another degree or so last night and are now at about 72 degrees in the main lake. The walleyes and saugers didn’t seem to like it much either. Another cold morning and another slow start. Nothing new there I guess.

Well anytime you get several men from one family together in a boat, it’s not going to be unusual to hear alot of stupid talk. I guess we took care of that at least. Family is always good for something!

The walleyes and saugers did start to show up little by little as the day wore on. Slower than yesterday, but at least we were catching a few. Dan mentioned that the biggest walleye or sauger he ever caught was only about 24" long and that he sure would like to catch a bigger one. Gerard, Dan and Bob each had at least one keeper fish in the box and another seven or eight smaller ones had been released when we decided to take a break and go eat lunch at Fitz’s restaurant up in Okee Bay.

With 15-20mph winds blowing right down the lake out of the east/northeast, the ride up to Fitz’s was a little bumpy. If you haven’t stop in at Fitz’s for lunch on the lake, your missing a real treat! I’ll tell you what, you won’t leave hungry. Those were the biggest dang turkey sandwich’s I’ve ever tried to eat. Even though I wanted to, I just couldn’t quite finish the last couple of bites.

After lunch, we headed back down the lake to try our luck for a little while longer. I didn’t really get the feeling that Bob or Gerard really cared much if we fished or just went back to the trucks and took a nap or something. After that lunch, who could blame them. Guess I wasn’t ready to give up just yet. Good thing to because Gerard caught an 18" sauger soon after we dropped the crawler rigs down. Kind of looked like a good sign and I thought; Maybe they’ll start biting!

Nope, another half hour later and not another walleye or sauger. I had to talked them into trying one more spot before putting the rods away.

We didn’t go far in the new spot and Dan hooked into a pretty good fish. He thought it was a sheepshead for sure because it was fighting to hard for a walleye. I got the net ready anyway, just in case. When that fish stuck it’s head out of the water, a bunch of people in the boat got real excited. It wasn’t a sheepshead, but a very nice, fat, 25 inch long saugeye! I haven’t seen a saugeye come in the boat in a long time. It sure was great to see my nephew land his biggest walleye, sauger or saugeye to date.

Congratulations on a nice catch Dan!

On that note, all of us decided that was enough for one day. The cold, wet morning and chilly wind had pretty much wore us out. And after seeing Dan catch that fish, everyone seemed to be going home with a smile on their face. It was a nice way to end a tough day on the water.

Good to see you again Bob!

Take care and hope to see you again soon.