Well Today was another good indication that the walleyes are not all that satisfied with the nutrition provided by a steady stream of mayflies over the past month. We have been laying the wood to the fish over the past few weeks, and today was no different. I had Andy and Tucker from Southeastern Minnesota in the boat today. We landed 27 fish over 20 inches during our 8-4 Bankers hours Walleye expedition. Tucker wins the honors for biggest fish with a girthy 26 inch bruiser. Andy took a close second to his son with a nice fat 25.5, but it WAS 25.5 buddy!!! LOL! Lots of Rainy Lake FATS!!!!
Beautiful day on the lake today with sunshine and light winds. Here was our game plan for the day. CATCH BIG FISH!! LOL! Isn’t that typically the game plan??? We focused our efforts hovering over Rock pile/Mud Transition lines. The best producers of course had favorable winds as of late. Today the winds were lighter than I’d prefer, but the fish held there grounds from the previous days breeze. After precisely locating these fish we held the boat directly over top of the fish staying with a vertical H20 Precision presentation tipped with a Crawler, Leech, Minnow, or Ringworm. LIGHTS OUT!!!
Both Andy and Tucker made many comments on the fierce fight these Rainy Walleyes put forth. I too agree having fished walleyes all over the state and Canada that these walleyes up here are very strong fish. Beautiful Black Backed Goldish/Yellow walleyes. I’m sure there are many methods that would put fish in the boat on top of these active fish, but picking walleyes out of these rock piles is much more effective with a finesse jigging presentation. Trust me you would spend much of your time spooking fish out with other presentations as you’d likely be snagged A LOT!!! One other key today was we either picked fish out of pockets hovering over top of the breaklines or anchored a safe distance away casting into them. Either way we were very careful not to spook or disturb these fish.
I would also like to point out the fact that there is an incredible difference in action from fishing a location to fishing the spot on the spot on the spot. Couple that with a hunting mentality being careful not to spook the fish makes a big difference in overall action. We never fished within a 1/4 mile of any other fisherman today, and when the boats started closing in we duplicated the pattern over and over. One of the great things besides the girthy fish is being able to fish with the Solitudes and Tranquility of Voyaguers National Park as a backdrop. We have 220,000 acres to roam in search of the Elusive walleye. Today we covered a micro portion of this magnificent fishery!!! Great fishing Boys!!! How do you like that Rod holder Tucker??? 1(26) 2(25’s) 4(24,s) and the bulk of our catch measuring 20-23 inches! Catch, Photo, and Release these bruisers. We released many of these fish boatside never even taking the fish into the boat. If they came in we took a quick measurement and immediately released the fish. When releasing fish Be sure to hold them upright in the water holding the tail lightly in your had until the fish gains enough strength back to pull away. Taking the extra precautions will ensure your 26 inch released fish has the chance to be the next Rainy 30!
beautiful golden eyes, grea report
Excellent report Rainydaze and congrats on another successful outing!
You gotta love those dark colored walleyes! 
Good job up there and keep the reports coming!
Great read and very nice looking walleyes
Yesterday we dealt with Hurricane winds. Picked up some nice eating fish prior to shorelunch with a 3 big fish between 24-26 inches. After shorelunch my group decided battling the raging Rainy wasn’t in the cards for us. Tipped our hat to the winds, and opted to fish a little secluded area from the wind. We moved ourselves around to actually find the balls of mayflies on the graph. Once located we easily saw the walleyes up suspended destroying these flies 5-6 feet up. We opted to give it a shot. H20’s in a 1/8 oz. swimming it throught the mayfly concentrations with Jumbo Leeches. Missed a few, and Picked off 6 more nice healthy fish. 3 were in the protected slots, and 3 were a hair under 17. Wouldn’t necessarily suggest this to be a plan A for anyone, but at times you need to adjust your gameplans when Ma nature takes some deep breaths!! The thing about Mayfly concentrations are that the WILL group the fish. The trick is triggering fish that are full to hit a different presentation. Nightcrawlers or Leeches seem to be the best options. Funny thing is that these fish were stacke up under the fly scum, and not anywhere else around them. SOOOOOOO….. As much as we curse the fly hatch… Sometimes they can and will play to your advantage. Certainly didn’t rewrite the record books, and seeing the concentrations and only picking a few off might drive the average angler crazy, but 6 more fish is 6 more fish in tough conditions.
Hard to imagine such non-stop action! Save some of those “bad boys” for our trip, OK, Rainy? Keep on fishing!
Great Report
Nice Fish
I would just like to say that Chris did a great job on putting us on the big walleyes! There were many more big walleyes that are not pictured here. We had a fantastic time Chris, and keep using steroids in those fish as they are some of the best fighting walleyes we have caught. Thanks again Chris!
Yeah they sure do fight hard up here. I hope you guys got into several more pigs during the rest of your trip. Now you just need to get yourself up here in the fall or winter. Had a great time with you guys! Oh… Tucker you’ve got another one!!! LOL!!! I think my rod holder is just about wore out! Take Care Team, and hope to see you guys up here again soon!
Nice report.