Mississippi River Pool 3 Dam Report 7-16-07

My last couple of outings on the mighty river have been spent on pool 3 in pursuit of those wingdam walleyes. The fishing on this section of river has still been very good for my boat. All though a change in presentation was needed, I am still seeing 20-30 nice walleye in an all day outing.

The crank bait bite that was so good to me has slowly diminished on the last couple of outings with the walleyes showing a strong preference for jigs tipped with crawlers and leeches. Cranks are still taking some nice fish for me but a large majority have been on bait. Orange/chartreuse and black precision heads in the 1/8oz to 3/16oz sizes have been best for me. Looking for dams with flow on them has been a must. The fish have been coming very shallow for me with the tops and tips being most productive. I have seen an occasional fish down deep at the tip of the dam but for the most part right on top has been most productive.

Last Thursday I shared my boat with friend Tim Drexler. Tim and I spent a couple of hours casting cranks with limited success until we switched over to jigs and bait. Tim is pictured here with his best fish of the day caught on a jig and crawler. This was the first walleye Tim caught once we made the switch over to bait. The North wind was howling on this day forcing us to fish jigs in the 1/4oz size. With the strong winds the areas we could fish were limited but we were able to sneak in on a few wing dams with less wind and pull some really nice eyes in to the boat. Thanks for keeping me company Thursday Tim We will do it again soon.

On Sunday I shared my boat with Chris Backhaus and Rashad. I met Chris and Rashad 4 years ago at the annual ARM (Anglers as Role Models) Event that we put on at Everts Resort. I have been lucky enough to fish with them at two of the ARM events, and again at least once during the summer months for the past couple of years. Our day was spent focusing on the wing dams. We started our day casting cranks with a 23” eye in a couple of casts. I thought to myself………..great, maybe my crank bait bite was alive again . A few wing dams later, it was apparent that the crank bait bite was not going to kick in to high gear for us. Upon switching over to bait, we were immediately rewarded with walleyes that had already passed on the cranks . The program for the remainder of the day was to jump dam to dam in search of active fish. By days end we never topped the 23” eye that we had right away at the start for the day but we were able to boat 30 legal walleyes with a majority of our fish in the 20“-21”class. The only drawback to the day was neither one of us got the “one big bite” . Thanks again for spending a day in my boat Chris and Rashad. I am looking forward to the next time!

The water clarity is still great for this time of year. The flow is next to nothing on both pool 3 and 4. Finding areas with more flow serve as good ambush points for feeding walleyes and many other species. The white bass, smallmouth and catfish have all been willing participants when you find an area with good flow.

That’s all for now!

I’ll see ya on the river