Lincoln area lakes walleye report 4-30-08 & 5-1-08

I was finally able to hit a couple of Lincoln area lakes for some walleyes this week. Water temps have warmed into the upper 50’s and I found a lot shad in the shallows with the walleye and a few other predators not too far behind. After working on my jig pitching skills a few weeks ago on Pool 4 of the Mississippi River I’ve been looking forward to this shallow water bite on some of our Nebraska Reservoirs.

This years weather patterns have been some of the strangest I can remember in years. It just seems like it’s been tough to get more than 2 or 3 days of consistently warm weather. We’ve been faced with cold front after cold front with no relief in sight until this week. After several days of sunshine and warm temps with South winds I knew it was time to start pitching shallow water. I headed over to one of my favorite Lincoln area lakes on Wednesday and immediately headed to the wind blown side of the lake. I found a small break line of a point that ran perpendicular to the main shoreline and anchored up so I could pitch directly to the main shore, yet cover different depths by pitching between the top and bottom of the break. It didn’t take long to hook up with my first walleye of the day. It was only a little over 14 inches but this proved to me that the walleyes were indeed in a feeding mode. I had a few more small walleye fall to my 1/8 oz. jig and ring worm combo before switching to a 3/16 oz. jig and 5 in. swim bait combo. Increasing my bait size meant working the bait a little faster but the fish didn’t seem to mind. Just when I thought my bait might be too big a 14 inch walleye completely inhaled my larger presentation. This walleye was soon followed by 3 others on my next 6 casts. This area also produced a handful of small largemouth bass. What a great way to end a great evening on the water.

The following morning I headed to a different lake to see if I could find a similar bite. Water temps were similar on both bodies of water but the wind had changed direction a little and was blowing a little harder than the night before. I preceded to the wind blown side of the lake and headed to a break line I seen on my GPS with a map card. After struggling for a short time to get my anchor to hold I finally got set up and started pitching. I missed a couple of hits and decided I better try anchoring in a little different spot to more effectively cast my jig. With the stronger winds I wanted to use a heavier jig but the fish didn’t seem to respond to the speed required to work it. I switched to the 1/8 oz. jig and ringworm combo and soon found that the fish were there as predicted. Switching to the lighter jig slowed its falling rate down quite a bit and this seemed to be what they wanted. The only problem with the lighter jig in the 30 mph winds was that I was only able to pitch with the wind directly at my back. In order to cover the break I had to reposition my boat several times. I managed to land 4 small eyes and a couple of small largemouth bass before I headed to the boat ramp so I could get to work.

I headed back out again after work on Thursday evening. This time I joined my friends Gene and Jake Brueggemann for a quick trip up North where I started on Wednesday evening. The wind was yet another direction and blowing less than 10 MPH. We had to adjust so we were pitching into the wind toward the top of the break. In the short time we were on the water we landed several small largemouth bass and 2 walleye, one of witch was around 18 inches.

With cold fronts coming through again today I think I’m going to wait for the next warm up with some South winds to hit these same types of areas again. If you don’t own a boat some of these fish can be caught by wading out from shore. Just look at a lake map with contours and try to find some points and breaks on the wind blown side of the lake. Good luck to everyone as the open water season across the country gets into full swing.