I'm new to SE Michigan and especially to fishing open water. I grew up in Indiana fishing gravel ponds and reservoirs. I need a quick and dirty education about where to go and what to use. I hear that Walleye is hot right now. Where should I go, and what gear do I need?
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Welcome to the Walleye Capital of the World. Fishing has been good, and I should be able to help you out, but I need some more info. How big is your boat? Are you set up to troll or drift? Lots of questions, lots of answers to come....zip me an e-mail at allenc@co.lucas.oh.us and I'll see if I can't point you in the right direction.
FYI, you cannot possess walleyes in the Michigan waters of Erie until June 1st......special regulations close those waters in April and May every year.
Looking forward to hearing from you.
BFG
Official Ohio Delegate to Team Heavy Super-Sized Fishing Specialists bfg@educatedangler.com
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don't do it through emails - there are other members who could benefit from the discussion I'm sure. Roamer has a boat in Toledo Beach on Erie so we might gain some valuable knowledge from putting some Walleyes in the boat - some of which will end up in my freezer
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"Wind" away! I'm going to need all the help I can get, and I'm sure a lot of others will appreciate it too.
BTW, I grew up down the road from you in Fremont. Used to fish the Sandusky River for bullheads and the spring white bass run. Now I hear they have a spring walleye run too. Where were they when I was a kid?
Looking forward to your guidance.
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I was born and raised here on Brest Bay on Lake Erie. What a great fishery for sure. June 1st is right around the corner and the walleye are waiting. My favorite way to fish for them is drifting with a bottom bouncer and crawler harness. Year after year it is a consistant producer and it saves on gas!! Casting weight forward spinners is good too. After you find the 'eyes you'll be done in a couple of hours with your limit!! Hail the "Fishin' Chip" on channel 68 when you are out there and I'll let you know where they are!! Best,
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First things first, IT'S TIME TO HAMMER THE 'EYES IN THE MICHIGAN WATER BABY!
There, now that I've done that, let's get dirty and slimey! My friends and I prefer to troll, (see my signature) but to be brutally honest, most fisherman on Erie still drift......and they still catch a ton of fish doing so. So I guess I'll start right there. This is only my opinion, and I'm sure there are many, many other Erie experts that may differ from me, but you asked, so here it comes!
You need some chop to effectively catch fish via the drift method. 1-3's are perfect, but I've done it in as heavy as 5'ers and still caught fish. The "old tried and true" method of using weight forward spinners (Erie Dearies, Jon-L's, etc) will still work, but there is a better mousetrap my friend. It's called the Weapon, aka Mayfly rig. Basically it's a single hook (small octopus hooks work great) with two red/gold/green beads in front of it and a small Colorado blade (GOLD!) in front of the beads. You can buy these rigs at most tackle shops around the lake. I've made my own, and for what it costs, you might as well buy them....lol. You will need GOOD, HEALTHY nightcrawlers, although with the small hook, you only need a small piece. I prefer to use the tail end, as the head (dark end) is thicker and the fish seem to like the tail better anyway. Most pre-tied rigs will have a loop knot on the end, to which you can attach it to a swivel on your main line. Before you tie your swivel on, slide an egg sinker on, add another red bead, then tie the swivel and connect the rig. The size of the egg sinker needed will depend on several things: depth of water, speed of drift, location of fish in the water column. I normally start out with 1/2 oz for most days, but have used as light as 1/4oz and as heavy as 1oz. When you set down to fish, stand on the WINDY side of the boat in regards to the drift/waves. Watch your sonar for marks up high, as most guys will typically fish below the fish, which is not good. I'll start by casting out, counting to five, then slowly pumping the rod, retrieving line on the drop, until it's back to the boat. If you don't catch fish counting to 5, proceed to 10, 15, and so on. If you still don't catch fish, MOVE! The hits will be either a "slow pull" or a "thump." Expect to catch "others" with this method as well (i.e. perch, white bass, sheepshead, catfish, etc.). If you find a pocket of active fish, and then they shut off, pick up and motor AROUND, NOT THROUGH the area and go back through them again. The action can be fast and furious, as I recall one trip two years ago off Fermi II in which we caught a 6 man limit (36 fish) in 90 minutes making 2 drifts. The fish were in the top 7', and we were fishing in 24fow....and it was July 5th.
Many also employ "bottom bouncers" as dead stick rigs while casting the mayfly rigs. Kind of a "Set it and Forget it" method. Baitcast reels with 7' rods work well. Three hook nightcrawler harnesses on 4-6' leads with the same beads, blades, etc. work well. Use enough weight on the bouncer to maintain a 45 degree down angle into the water while drifting. Set the drag a little loose, so that when a fish hits, you'll not have to break your leg trying to get to the rod in such a hurry. Keep these rods out of the way, preferably towards the bow of the boat. There are days when the walleyes decide to stick their noses in the mud, and on those days, the bottom bouncers shine. Once again, you must have decent chop for this to work properly.
Trolling: If you are going to troll (yeah baby) you will cover a lot more water and be able to find fish much faster than with drifting. We use 10# mono for our main line, and then tie 25' of Vanish fluorocarbon for a leader at the end. A typical spread involves using two inline boards (Offshore, Church, etc) per side of the boat, one dipsey diver per side, and normally a "Widowmaker" down the chute (straight out the back). We also use riggers, but you do not need them if you do not have them for Erie. Different lures shine during different times of the year. For instance...in the spring, we use Ripsticks, Reef Runners, Deep Little Rippers, Thundersticks, Bomber Long-A's, and Rapalas, as the fish like a slower wobble to the baits.....for summer we'll change to HotnTots, Wiggle Warts, Rapala Taildancers, and Spoons, much faster action...for fall, we go back to the spring pattern again. An invaluable tool to purchase before you set out to troll on any of the Great Lakes is Precision Trolling. Buy a copy of this reference guide, so that you will know how deep your lures are running at varying trolling speeds depending on how much line you have out. You'll also need to have some way of determining how much line is in the water, and line counter reels are an easy way to accomplish that feat. If you do not have linecounter reels, have a buddy pull line off your reel and then mark how much line goes out from one side of the spool to the other. That method is called "counting passes", and it works just as easily.
I like to set the outside boards up as the "longest leads" in the setup. The bait is typically 80-100' behind the board. The inside board is usually 60' or so, and then you have your dipsey set on 1 or 2 about 35-50' behind the boat. All this is subject to change pending the water depth, but should work fine in water deeper than 15' or so. If you hit bottom, snug things up a bit (closer). If you need to get deeper than your cranks will run, use either inline bead chain sinkers or Snap weights. 50' in front of the crank is where the Snap weight should go. We will also be splicing two colors of leadcore into our board rigs this year, thus eliminating the need for the inline/attached weights. Two colors of core will get you about 10' of depth at trolling speed. Attach the board about 10' after the core is out, using a 30' Vanish leader on the business end that gets the lure. Jim Athey from this site has illustrated the way to attach leadcore and mono. You should be able to find it in the archives.
Spoons: Stinger Scorpions, Silver Streak Jr's, etc. work fine. We run spoons off the dipseys and riggers, but you could run them off the two color core setup. Be sure to get spoons with either a copper or gold back, hammered finish is even better, and then those with purple, pink, and blue on them in some sort of pattern. Black dots are good, add them if there are none on the spoon.
Crank Colors: For the "long body" cranks, Rainbow trout, clown, blues, and silvers seem to work best for us. As summer comes around, then it's gold, gold, gold, for the cranks. A gold Hot n Tot with the black belly and back stripe has been a great summer bait for a long time now. The perch pattern Rapala Taildancer is also an excellent summer crank.
Location: Wow, this is a tough one. Walleyes are much more nomadic than people give them credit for, so be prepared to move around when trying to locate fish. Don't fish the pack.....I can't emphasize that enough. Find your own fish, the lake is big and the fish are all over the place. This time of year, off the Fermi II plant is usually very good, along with the Raisin river mouth area, off of Brest Bay, and near the Shipping Channel. Try to cover the entire water column when searching for fish, that way, when you do hit a fish or two, you can change your spread accordingly. Once you can establish a pattern, (depth, speed, lure, color, etc.) you can count on putting fish in the box. Don't be afraid to change, as a lot of guys will catch two fish in the first 15 minutes and then not change a thing the rest of the day, and then be mad at the fish for "shutting off." Hellllloooooo conditions change minute to minute, so be ready for that. Up, down, in, out, color, speed, direction, etc., can all be toyed with to help you catch more fish.
Where to launch: Bolles Harbor near Monroe (exit 11 off I-75) and Sterling State Park off the Dixie Highway are probably the ones that we use the most. I'm sure there are more, but these two are good.
I'll be out on Erie tomorrow afternoon and all day Friday. I'll post up a report when I get time. If you have any more questions, let me know, as I have more info, but my fingers just entered the first stages of carpal tunnel.
Good luck,
BFG
Official Ohio Delegate to Team Heavy Super-Sized Fishing Specialists bfg@educatedangler.com
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Well, GreenBoat "Asked an Educated Angler" and it didn't say "Ask an Educated Salmon/Trout Angler" so I thought I'd bore everybody with my banter on that thread......lol
Can you believe I had to stop myself......there's so much more.....lol
BFG
Official Ohio Delegate to Team Heavy Super-Sized Fishing Specialists bfg@educatedangler.com
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BFG: Thank you for the great write-up. I know the effort that it takes to compose a write-up like that, and I appreciate it. I'm looking forward to more of your reports.
CHIP: Thank you also for your input and offer to point us in the right direction. Some day, I'm going to beg you for a little private tutoring.
tiara3600 (god of EA): Hiatus has a good point. Maybe you can use your powers to move this string into the Walleye category under Great Lakes Forums.
YA GOTTA LOVE THIS SITE!
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