Red Wing, MN Pool 4 walleye Report

Our Christmas gifts on the river came a day late this week. But! That’s all right! I will take them anytime if they are going to look like these. The action on pool 4 this week still has been pretty good. Early morning and late afternoon are still putting the better quality fish in the boat.

My trip this week was with Marc Krantz from Swea City, Iowa. Our day started out at noon on this day. Marc said he just bought a bunch of Super Doo’s from B Fish N tackle and wanted to see if these Doo’s really worked. The action on this day seemed a little slower for quality saugers but did see a bunch of smaller fish make it too the boat. One would expect that starting out in the middle of the day. However, Marc did manage to land of couple of Pool 4’s dandies saugers. Nice Saugers Marc!

As the day went on we couldn’t wait for the sun to go behind the trees. Shallows here we come. Our presentation was ringworming again. Marc started out with Fire n Ice and I started out on FireCracker colored. I was hoping the walleyes ordered a color preference this afternoon but it seemed all they wanted was the right meal in the right place. I was about ready to call it a day when all of sudden if felt a train hit my ringworm. Followed by a call for a net and fast. I landed this 28” walleye pictured above. I am guessing about 9lbs. 6oz. Needless to say I didn’t want to end the day now. A cast later I followed up on this 23”(pictured above). Marc followed up by saying what in the #@$%# are you doing? The walleyes wanted one presentation this afternoon. They wanted that rod almost dead sticked. Short lift of the rod, just to get the tail in action, and let that worm just work itself in the wind and current. If you even twitched it there would be nothing. With that said Marc said you mean like this, followed by a hook set. Marc then landed this 6lber all in the same sentence. This was Marc’s biggest walleye to the date. A quick picture and back she went. Nice fish and thanks for the release. We ended up landing 12 walleyes just before she got dark. Once it was dark the bite just died. We caught those 12 walleyes all in about 20 minutes.

I know I sound like a broken record but the shallow bite is there. Early morning and late a1fternoons are going to be your best bet for walleyes. Biggest thing is PATIENCE. I almost pulled off one of my spots thinking the bite wasn’t there. I guess I was wrong.