Mississippi River Walleye Fishing Report 10-22-07

The walleye bite has remained the same for my boat on the last couple of trips. I am not seeing a large number of walleye but the quality has helped fill the lack of numbers . With the higher stage and flow, targeting areas with slower moving water has been key for those bigger walleye.

My best presentation for these bigger walleye on the last couple of outings has been casting plastics and hair jigs to the shoreline eddies and current breaks. Casting cranks has taken a back seat on my last couple of trips with nothing to show for my shallow water cranking. Although the cranks did not produce on the last couple of trips it’s still to early to put them away for fall with the water temps hovering in the mid 50’s. The biggest obstacle to conquer with the crank baits is getting them in to the strike zone if the fish are holding in a deeper eddy or current break.

I shared my boat with Steve Erickson last Wednesday. Our goal for the day was to boat some bigger walleye with some eaters in the mix. While we did boat a couple of dandy walleyes the bigger numbers of fish eluded us on this day . Casting 5” firecracker k-grubs on black or sour apple precision heads did the trick on the two nicer fish that we boated this day. We methodically worked the area we were targeting with cranks, hair jigs, and other assorted plastics to no avail. . The 5” firecracker k-grub ruled supreme as the best bait on this trip! Steve, it was great fishing with you again and I am looking forward to our Spring trip on the mighty river. Maybe I’ll see you out and about this fall again .

On Sunday I shared my boat with Tom Palahniuk. We went in search of those bigger walleye and were fortunate enough to find a couple. Tom is pictured here with the biggest eye of the day caught on a 5”firecracker k-grub . Nice eye Tom! Since this has been my best bait on the last couple of outings I let Tom fish the 5”grub most of the day while I experimented and kept switching it up on an off looking for other baits that would turn some more walleye. I went thru my milk run of colors and plastic baits with out success. My best bait on this day was a Kelly Green hair jig. These were the only two baits that boated fish for us on this day.

Tom and I spent a lot of time in one area on this day playing the waiting game. We went walleye-less for quite a few hours then the walleye decided to snap, we did all of our damage in a 1 ½ hour span then it was over. We did not boat a large number of fish on this day but the quality was there with all of our fish over 22” except for three eaters. On days with a slower bite, having confidence in your spots can pay off big dividends if you have the patience and confidence to wait them out. Tom it was great sharing my boat with you again. Thanks for the company !

The mighty river is still on the rise. The rivers stage was 5.1 in the am hours on Sunday. As of right now, the river is projected to come up 3 more feet by October 26th. The walleyes are going to be moving around fighting their way out of the current. Look for dead slack water areas, deep and shallow, for best results in the up coming week. The bigger the eddy or current break, the more fish it will hold. Do not let the higher water detour you from fishing the river. High water actually makes it easier to locate fish once you learn to understand moving water and how the fish position themselves. Once located, there is usually a good number of them present and willing to eat!

Fall is here, if you are looking to boat a large walleye………….. think shallow and think big!

I’ll see you on the river!