Reprinted from the Sioux City Journal

WEBSTER, S.D. — Our plan was to hit two lakes a day and take full advantage of the variety of fishing to be found in the Glacial Lakes area of northeastern South Dakota.

Mother Nature threw us a curve, however, and rather than fight 25 to 30 mile-an-hour winds, we fished mornings and motored off the water pounding against a spray of white caps each afternoon.

The first morning was the worst.

A south wind was blasting at 20 miles an hour by 10 a.m. We parked at the boat ramp on Reetz Lake, just south of Webster.

“We won’t last long, out there,” I said to Fran. “We might be able to get out of the wind along that west shoreline.”

I had not planned to fish Reetz. Less than a month earlier I had fished it and caught several walleyes over 20 inches there. But, with the wind I thought our chances were better here on a lake where all walleyes under 28-inches have to be released.

We lasted about an hour and a half and boated two nice walleyes on bottom bouncers and spinners fished in 12 to 14 feet of water.

The rest of the afternoon we spend prospecting other lakes and checking out boat ramps for the next day.

With the wind forecast to blow again, we launched the next morning on Enemy Swim Lake, long one of the northeast’s glacial gems.

It’s a beautiful lake. Clear water, wooded shorelines and a couple of islands. It’s 2,150 acres with a maximum depth of 24 feet. All bass between 14 and 18 inches must be released with only one over 18 allowed in the daily bag. That just about guarantees good bass fishing and that is just what we found.

We started on one of the main lake points casting crankbaits and spinnerbaits in water nine feet and less, but never brought up a bass. We moved deeper on the same point and switched to bottom bouncers and spinners with crawlers.

Again, nothing. Only perch.

We left that spot and headed for a small rocky island nearby and that’s where we found the bass.

Smallies were laying in the shallow, boulder-studded water and were more than willing to take our Big O crankbaits.

We worked through that area and moved down towards some pencil reeds and banged the biggest of several largemouth we took that day.

We fished some other good spots and then, tired of casting, we put on slip bobbers and began looking for bluegills adjacent to pencil reed flats.

We found some nice ones, but surprise, surprise, we also found more smallmouth.

Tucked into heavy coontail growths, the smallies smacked our worm-baited hooks just as willingly as the bluegills and I was soon casting a shallow diver crankbait and taking them on that, too.

We were able to hide from the 20 mph west wind and play with these weed fish until late afternoon.

We pounded through the surf back to the boat ramp and over dinner that evening planned our next day.

Crappies had been biting well on Pickeral Lake, a 981-acre lake just a couple miles north of Enemy Swim. Although the bite had faded from what it once was, we decided to go there. It was, afterall, on our list of lakes to fish on this wind-plagued trip.

The next morning found us leaving the boat ramp in a stiff breeze out of the northwest. I had no idea where the crappies might be, but I suspected there would be some along deep water weedlines or maybe others suspended over deep water.

We found a long, underwater point on the west side at the south end of the lake.

We started out drifting one-eighth-ounce Road Runner jigs tipped with a crawler fished under a 1/16-ounce mini jig tied about 18 inches above the Road Runner.

We found the crappies grouped on an inside bend at the very tip of the bar, but it was tough to hold on the area in the ever-increasing wind. Bottom bouncers and spinners worked as well. We caught perch, crappies, bluegill walleye and smallmouth on that point, but as the wind grew our enthusiasm dimmed.

“We’ll come back again,” we decided. “Maybe the wind won’t blow.”

(But I wouldn’t count on it.)

TEKAMAH, NEB. — It probably wasn’t the kind of day you would pick for catfishing, but nobody told the cats.

Pat Carter, Elk Point, S.D., and I arrived at Summit Lake in the middle of a morning rainstorm, but when the downpour turned to sprinkles, we launched my boat and headed out.

Pat had fished the lake a couple times before and was impressed with the channel catfish to be found there. When he suggested we give it a try, I was quick to agree.

For the past seven years, Pat and I have gotten together prior to Sioux City’s one and only catfish tournament and spend a day or an evening chasing “ole whiskers.”

It’s a tradition now and what began as a U.S. CATS sponsored tournament is now a local tournament with Pat as the director. Strong sponsor support from local businesses, headed by First Class Credit Union, and individuals is quickly making this event one of the premier catfish tournaments in the country.

Last year the First Class Cat Attack attracted 51 teams with entries from a seven-state area. This year Pat hopes to top 60 boats and is well on his way. Current entries exceed last year’s.

This year, the boats will blast off from the South Sioux City boat ramp with waters of the Missouri and Big Sioux Rivers eligible.

Last year’s event was won by Dean and Bruce Strobman of Sioux City with a single catch — a 56.60-pound blue catfish. Second was taken by Keith Copenhaver, Sioux City, and Chris Sharp, Merrill, Iowa with 10 fish weighing 40.90 pounds.

In all, anglers weighed in 155 fish totaling 500.15 pounds, the highest weight in the history of the tournament.

This year’s event will be July 24 with anglers fishing from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. The event has a $5,000 guaranteed payout. Cash awards will be given for first through 6th place with additional cash placements for over 30 teams. Seventh to 15th place teams will win door prizes. Additional door prizes will be offered including a trolling motor, depth finder and rods and reels.

Entry automatically qualifies teams for the 2010 Night Tournament from 7p.m. to 8 a.m. Sept. 4.

The public is welcome to the weigh-in at the ramp. A free cookout and drinks will be available beginning at 3 p.m.

Entry fee for the event is $100 with an optional $10 for the big fish Pot. Entries are being accepted at the Bacon Creek Country Store at 2520 Gordon Dr. Entries will also be accepted, cash only, the morning of the tournament. A mandatory rules meeting will begin at 6:30 a.m.

For more information, contact Pat Carter at (712) 281-1841 or email: imcoolcatpat@yahoo.com.

Check out the web site at: www.firstclasscatattack.tk

Oh, our Summit Lake catfish?

Suffice it to say that had we been in a tournament, we would have done well.

Isn’t that how it goes?

Lake Information:

Summit Lake

Where: 4 1/2 West, 1/2 South of Tekamah

Size: 190 acres

Max Depth: 30 feet

Boat Ramps: Two

Camping: Yes

Fish: Largemouth Bass, Bluegill, Channel Catfish, Walleye

Motorboats: Limited to 5 mph (no wake).

Panfish: Daily bag limit is 10; channel catfish daily bag limit is three.

If you’ve spent much time on the water, it’s happened to you at least once,  or maybe even a dozen times.

You’ve hook into what you believe to be a good fish and it’s peeling off yard after yard of line, you’re thinking, I hope the line doesn’t break!

Just about the time you think you have everything under control, your line goes limp and the fish, a state record in your mind, swims off with you lure.

If you’re like me, you jump up and down, holler and you use several of those “descriptive” adjectives your mother told you not to use as a kid.

“Darn line, broke again”, any way that’s where everyone places the blame!

As you reel line in, you notice that the line’s corkscrewed, the end of it looking similar to a pigtail.

Well, that’s a good indicator that it wasn’t a line break, your knot has either slipped or burned through!

Poorly tied knots are the main reason people loose fish, others are that they tried to drag the fish in, not allowing the drag on the reel to work properly or they hadn’t allowed their rod to do it’s job and not fighting the fish until it was tired.

In this article we’ll talk about knots!

I know, everyone knows how to tie knots right, because we learned as kids when we learned how to tie our shoes!

There are several knots out there that really work well and the old overhand knot like you tied as a kid is not one of them.

When you tie a knot, you’re taking away from the strength of the line; actually reducing it’s strength.

So you want to tie the best knot you can and this means either the Clinch knot for monofilament line or the Palomar knot for braided line.

The improved clinch is really easy to tie!

Run the line once or twice through the eye of your hook or lure (once for a clinch knot and twice for the improved clinch knot), then wrap the line five to eight times around the line back towards the hook or lure.

Once you’ve wrapped the line, slide the loose end of the line through your initial loop.

Then comes the really important part!

You’ll then need to wet the line and tighten the knot with a steady even motion, without hesitation.

If you don’t wet the line, the friction created by sliding the monofilament against itself will burn or fray the line, reducing the strength of the line even more..

Try to keep your line as straight as possible because every time you cross the line over itself, there’s a chance of breakage.

The Clinch knot will give you a knot that is somewhere around 60 or 65% line strength.  In other wards if you have 10-pound line and tie a good clinch knot, your line might break at 6 or 6.5 pounds.

Which is really no problem as you can land some really big fish on light line as long as you have a good knot, use your rod correctly, have your drag set properly and you don’t try to “horse” the fish in.

If you’re using a braided line such as Fireline, Spiderwire or any of the other super lines, you’re going to want to use a Palomar knot.

With this knot, you double your line before you put it through the eye of the hook or lure, then you tie and overhand knot, with the loop that is left over, run it around the hook or lure and pull it tight.

Wetting the knot isn’t as important as it with monofilament line because braided line is tougher than nails.

The Palomar Knot is a 90% line strength knot so it is the best knot no matter what line you use, just remember when using monofilament line moisten it before you pull the knot tight.

Knots may not seem like a big deal, but if you tie a poor one, the best rod, reel and fishing knowledge won’t do you much good because a good knot is all that truly connects you to that fish of a lifetime!

How to Tie a Cinch & Palomar Knot

Knot Tying – The Improved Clinch Knot

1.  An old standby for fishermen.  Pass the line through the eye of hook, swivel or lure.   Double back and make 5 turns around the standing line.

Hold the coils in place; thread end of line through the first loop above the eye, then through the big loop as shown

.                 2.  Hold the tag end and standing line while coils are pulled up.  Take care that coils are in spiral, not lapping over each other.  Slide tight against the eye.  Clip tag end

The PALOMAR KNOT – For Joining Line To A Fish Hook

The Palomar Knot is easy to tie correctly, and consistently the strongest knot known to hold terminal tackle.

1.  Double about 4″ of line and pass the loop through the eye of fishing hook.

2.   Let the fishing hook hang loose, and tie an overhand knot in the doubled line.

Avoid twisting the lines and do NOT tighten the knot.

3.   Pull the loop end of the line far enough to pass it over the hook, swivel or lure.

Make sure the loop passes completely over the attachment.

4.   Pull both the tag end and the standing line until the knot is tightened.  Clip off the tag end of the fishing line.

ISLE Minn. — “Inch for inch, pound for pound, the gamest fish that swims.”

That’s a quote from Dr. James Henshall’s “Book of the Black Bass.”

Dr. Henshall’s book was published in 1881.

That was 129 years ago.

And you know what? It still holds true today.

The smallmouth bass is, without question, the gamest fish that swims.

Dr. Henshall, a midwestern medical doctor and devotee of bass fishing was writing at a time when trout was the kingpin of angling endeavors throughout the populated East.

Fly fishing was the method of choice and native brook trout was the quarry. German browns were soon to take over the limelight, but they were not stocked in any numbers until 1884.

Henshall’s book was the measuring stick of all books written about the black bass through the nineteenth and most of the twentieth century.

But trout fishing held sway until the mid 1950s when another writer, Jason Lucas, angling editor or Sports Afield magazine, finally swayed public opinion towards the black bass.

In the South, largemouth bass is king. In the North, the walleye holds sway.

We have excellent bass fishing up here for both largemouth and smallmouth, but for most anglers the walleye is where it is at.

That just may be why the best smallmouth bass fishing ever seen on this continent is happening right now.

And one of the best places to tangle with “the gamest fish that swims” is Mille Lacs Lake in north-central Minnesota.

It’s no accident that phenomenal bass fishing exists here.

This 132,000-acre lake (that’s slightly more than 200 square miles) has scores of shallow rock reefs adjacent to deeper water which provides an ideal home for smallmouth bass.

It is also, basically, a catch-and-release lake. All smallmouth under 21 inches must be released immediately and the possession limit is one.

Every time I get on this lake I try to spend at least part of a day fishing smallmouth. And, I have never been disappointed.

Gary Howey, Hartington, Neb., and I were there a few weeks ago fishing walleyes.

We were guests at Hunter Winfields Resort (hunterwinfields.com)

Mike and his wife Margie own and operate the resort and Mike spends a lot of time guiding guests for the great walleye fishing that exists here.

But he also has a soft spot for smallmouth and we were soon on a large rock reef at the southeast corner of the lake. We began throwing topwaters and plastics, but the bass soon told us they wanted their food on top.

We fish a half dozen reefs that morning, all within easy boating distance and caught several bass, topped by a five-pound-plus lunker that ate Gary’s topwater.

More often than not, we’d observe a bass rolling on the surface chasing minnows and we’d cast there. Usually, the bass would strike.

If you’ve never caught a smallmouth, be prepared for a strong, dogged runs powering for deeper water and explosive jumps which will send water droplets over 20 feet away.

Most smallmouth will jump several times and not quit fighting until they are in the net.

If you haven’t fished Mille Lacs, you should. Walleye fishing is fantastic right now.

Hunter Winfields is located in the southeast corner of the lake and many excellent walleye reefs and humps are nearby as well as rocky reefs, marked with buoys, for smallmouth.

Charter boat fishing is also available here.

There is excellent fishing for northern pike and muskie as well, and largemouth bass frequent the bays and weed beds.

Maximum depth is 43 feet.

I’d highly recommend getting a Lakemaster chip for your depthfinder’s GPS for this lake. It will put you right on the spot of spots.

The walleye may be king here, but “pound for pound” it is the smallmouth that rules.

High water with heavy flows following a rain makes for tough fishing.

These seem to be the norm this year as there’s high water everywhere, coming down every creek, river as well as in all the ponds and lakes.

The bad side of this is that all the water running into the lakes and rivers, muddies up the water, making it hard to fish without getting your crankbaits, jigs and livebait rigs all gunked up.

The old wives tale, “with every bad there comes some good” is very true in this instance as water flowing into any body of water means the fish will start will be on the move.

It might take a few days for the water to settle down and the swift current to subside, but you can bet when there’s a rise in the water level, with water being released downstream the fish will become active.

The reason for this is pretty basic; the influx in water will bring new food sources down stream.

Worms, insects, zoo plankton as well as the baitfish and fingerlings that were tucked safely into the creeks and backwaters are now being flushed downstream into the rivers and lakes, bringing a smorgasbord to the fish that will be moving towards the incoming water on their way to see what’s on the menu.

In the river, sandbars and vegetation that were once high and dry will now become flooded and the insects and other material that was lying in these areas are now in the water.

In a river, this influx of water and new food sources will attract the fish to the slack water located behind sandbars and points.

Fish, both big and small will move towards the incoming water to feed on what’s being washed or forced downstream.

The biggest benefit of high water in reservoirs located on the Missouri River will reach capacity and water will need to be released through the dams.

Some of the deepest water in the system with the most hospitable water temperatures is located directly above the dam and because of this, there will be large concentrations of fish in these areas.

Once the gates are open to release the excess water from the lake a tremendous amount of water is released, flushing thousands of gallons of water and fish through the gates into the river system below.

On the Missouri as well as on other river systems, our dams are used for generating electricity and in order to drop the elevation of the lake, excess water may need to be run through the turbines of the dam as well, drawing fish on the upstream side through the generators, down into the river.

Fish sucked through the turbines can be cut up or injured and then deposited in the fast water down stream, dumping new fish into the river as well as adding a new food source downstream.

As the water levels rise and currents increases, the fish will move upstream into the more oxygenated water to feed on what’s being washed through the dam.

When water is being released, the fishing below generally improves, as numerous species of fish will have been relocated below the dam.

It’s always good to keep an eye on the information that the local paper has as far as the amount of water or CFS that’s being released through a dam, as a large increase is usually a pretty good indicator that there may be new fish coming through the turbines.

You never know what you might catch once new water has come into the river, as this is when anglers will start to pick up numerous varieties of fish, some which may not have been common in the area before the water release.

Prior to high water releases, the fishing below the dam may be slow, but several days after high water releases fish will become active.

When fishing below a dam that has released new water, you’ll want to keep your tackle pretty basic, as you won’t need anything fancy to catch fish during this time.

Try to use a light of weight as possible with a simple live bait rig consisting of a hook, split shot or lightweight sinker tipped with a crawler, leech or minnow being a good bet when fishing after water releases.

Some anglers like to use heavy weights to hold their bait in the current, keeping it on the bottom.

Unfortunately that may be where your rig stays as the heavy current can jam the weight tight into the rocks and other bottom obstructions where it may become part of the bottom structure once you’ve snagged up.

The lighter rigs will drift along with the current like the baitfish that have came through the dam, eventually settling in the slack water pockets where the game fish will be waiting for lunch to arrive.

No matter how you fish, be in from boat or shore, the next time there’s a big water discharge, give the fishing down stream a try as there’s bound to be fish moving up to see what all the fuss is about.

Does your hand twitch?

Bassmaster Classic champion Woo Daves of the Wrangler Rugged Wear Outdoor Advisory Team says the best fishing comes from giving the lure the best action. “Remember the factory can only put so much action into it. It is up to you to make the lure produce,” said Daves. “Twitch the rod tip. Change speeds of retrieve. Work the lure erratically. If you’re catching fish you are working the lure. If you’re not catching fish the lure is working you.”

Step on lure to set reel drag

To set reel drag, Ron Schara of the Wrangler Rugged Wear Outdoor Advisory Team steps on his lure with one foot then applies pressure on the rod, adjusting it to a point where the line does not break but the rod is bent appropriately. “At that point, I usually back it off just a smidgeon to allow for quick moves by a big fish that could snap the line,” said Schara, host of the Outdoor Channel’s popular TV Show, “Backroads with Ron and Raven.”

Fish with hand sanitizer

Fish use sight and smell to locate their prey. Manufacturers realize this and sell tons of scent attractants. Ron Tussel, the Pennsylvania pro, tells anglers at his seminars to go the extra step and keep their hands clean when handling baits. Tussel, a member of the Wrangler Rugged Wear Outdoor Advisory Team, says common scents such as gas and oil associated with boating can contaminate the lure and put fish off by the offending smell.  A simple hand sanitizer kept onboard can help keep the hands clean and scent free.

Fish large lures for spring lunkers

Bassmaster Classic champion Woo Daves tells anglers to fish big lures slowly in the spring for big bass. “Springtime usually brings a lot of off-colored water, so large baits and blades really produce,” said Daves, a member of the Wrangler Rugged Wear Outdoor Advisory Team.

Think shallow for muskies, northerns

Dean Capra of the Wrangler Rugged Wear Outdoor Advisory Team is an expert at getting cold-water fish to bite. In cold northern lakes he fishes shallow areas because shallow water heats up sooner and fish are more active. This is sight fishing. When Capra sees a muskie or northern pike soaking up sunshine he will cast a soft plastic jerk bait close, but not too close. “Let the bait sit there for awhile; you’re basically dead sticking it,” he said.

(Don’t) Fish the calm side

Do you like to fish where it’s calm or rough? Anglers who fish the calm side of the lake in the spring are making a big mistake, according to Bassmaster Classic champion Woo Daves of the Wrangler Rugged Wear Outdoor Advisory Team. “You should fish the windy side in the spring,” said Daves. “This is where the warmest water will be, this is where the plankton will be stirred up, and this is where the bait fish will be, especially on windy points, banks and coves.”

Live bait hook placement

Good hook-placement gives live bait anglers an advantage. Larry Bozka, host of CoastalAnglers.com and a member of the Wrangler Rugged Wear Outdoor Advisory Team, inserts the hook above the backbone at the rear of the dorsal fin when fishing under a float. This gives the bait vertical support. But when he is bottom fishing Bozka runs the hook below the backbone and above the anal vent. This lets the hook serve as a “keel” to keep the bait upright.

As we approached the buoy, the huge boulders and rocks deposited there by the glaciers started to appear below the surface.

Many were larger than our boat, extending out from a point into the lake at a depth of 12 foot, giving the smallmouth excellent hiding spots from which to ambush bait fish.

Team member Larry Myhre and I have been frequent visitors to Mille Lacs as it is an excellent fishery with good numbers of trophy size walleye, smallmouth, musky as well as numerous other species of fish.

We’d arrived the day before, hoping to have the opportunity to film a couple of our Outdoorsmen Adventures segments, if the weather didn’t force us to change our plans.

Mike strategically maneuvered the boat through the shallow water, positioning us within casting distance of many of the larger submerged boulders.

We were on the water early, trying to take advantage of nice weather hoping to beat the many fronts that would be coming through the area during the next couple of days.

Since we weren’t sure what the fish would want this morning, all three of us in the boat were rigged with different baits, allowing the fish to tell us which bait they preferred, once they did, we’d all switch to that bait and hammer on them.As we worked our way around and through the submerged rocks, a smallmouth smacked something floating on the surface off to our right.

I quickly switched from my crankbait to a surface popper propelling it in the general direction where the fish had risen.

After several cast, I could see a big smallmouth come up from behind one of the hundreds of boulders to take a whack at my lure.

The bass must have been far sighted or I was a little to anxious to boat a fish as he made a pass at my popper as it neared the boat, hitting ahead of the bait as I reared back on my rod, propelling the bait into the air.

Not to be deterred, I immediately cast right back into the same general area, only to pull the bait away from the bass once again.

This happens a lot in clear water, as the depth the fish is in can be deceiving and you’ll see the fish come up and jump on your bait, which can result in short strikes.

On my fourth cast, I had my hook set down perfectly and a battle ensued.

Smallmouth bass, known as “Bronze Bulldogs” are one of the most powerful fresh water fish you’ll find, diving deep, fighting hard and often going airborne or doing a tail walk across the top of the water, testing the gears in your reel as well as the line it’s spooled with.

The fish, a nice three pounder, gave me all I wanted, then coming into the boat for a few pictures, before being released back into the water.

Mike was the next to connect as another three pounder inhaled his bait right beside the boat.

Since their mouth is much smaller than that of their cousin thee largemouth bass, choose similar bait you’d throw for largemouth only in a more compact size.

Some of the best baits for smallmouth bass would be tube jigs, small crawdad imitating crank baits, smaller worm rigs and livebait.

Smallmouth are an extremely aggressive fish and will attack almost any bait pitched at them, so it’s very easy to fish them out of a certain area.

This is one of the reasons that many bodies of water that hold holding these fish have such stringent slot limits on them.

Smallmouth can grow to large size with the Minnesota state record being an 8 pounder, Nebraska’s record a 7 pound 4 oz. fish with the South Dakota state record smallmouth coming in at 6 pounds 9 oz.

Our morning excursion for smallmouth was a good one as we landed four nice fish one of which was over 4 pounds.

WEBSTER, S.D. — It was early morning, but there was no sunrise.

We sat in the parking lot at the boat ramp on Bitter Lake, my boat still on the trailer.

Across the western horizon an angry mass of blue clouds hung like a curtain, and sharp streaks of lightening occasionally ripped across its dark tapestry. So far, the rain was light and most of it would move north, but we waited.

It was afternoon before we felt safe enough to venture out. Les Rowland, a local, and longtime friend, had joined Gary Howey, Kyle Nickolite and me for this morning adventure.

We dragged bottom bouncers and spinners across a sunken bar and I took a 17-inch walleye right off the bat. But, that was it.

We fished three more hours without a bite.

Would tomorrow be any better?

It was.

No rain greeted us the next morning and we launched the boat on Reetz Lake just south of town. It’s a small lake with restrictive walleye limits. In fact, only one walleye over 28 inches may be kept.

That means there is a lot of walleyes in the lake, and we gambled that high numbers would result in more fish in the boat, but not the livewell.

We were right.

We started banging good walleyes right off the end of a cut bank on the west side. I could see the fish on the depth finder between 12 and 14 feet, lying right on the bottom. We caught a couple, but it wasn’t until the wind came up sending two footers into the shoreline that the real action began.

We quit at noon after boating a bunch of walleyes from three to five pounds on spinners and crawlers. We also bagged a couple smallmouth and big perch.

This is the time of the year when the temperatures will start to rise, as will the humidity, making for perfect conditions for nasty weather and tougher walleye fishing conditions.

This time of the year, fish have a lot of different conditions they have to adjust or relate to including: rising water temperatures, rising/falling barometric pressure, high water, low water and the summers bright sunlight all making walleye fishing during the Dog Days of summer tough.

There are a few keys to locating and catching fish this time of the year.  Deeper water and areas with less sunlight penetration are where the fish will be located this time of the year.

With the rise in water temperatures, walleyes and other species of fish will head into deeper water searching out comfortable water temperatures.

These deep-water haunts provide the cooler water temperatures that the fish need to survive when things heat up.

There are several reasons that the fish will relocate into the depths. Another of these is that their food source, baitfish has moved down bringing the predator fish with them.

There are several methods that will allow you to take these Deep-water fish, those that have worked well for me are: leadcore line, snap weights or downriggers dragging crankbaits.

During this time of the year, the movement of the fish can vary drastically, especially just prior to a sever weather change.

Fish are able to detect a change of weather well before it happens using their lateral line, which is a series of sensitive nerve endings extending from behind the gills to their tail.

Since they know that a sever weather change is about to occur, walleyes and other species of fish will go on a feeding binge prior to the arrival of the storm, then move deep, lying dormant on the bottom until weather conditions stabilize.

If you are unfortunate to have to fish these dormant fish after a storm has passed through, you’ll need a lot of patience and a precise bait presentation, such as a Lindy Rig.

I’ve had my best luck on these inactive fish by presenting my bait right in front of the walleyes nose and staying there until I make them mad enough to bite.

Since the sun is at its highest point this time of the year and walleyes are very light sensitive, they’re going to be more active in periods where sunlight penetration is minimal.

These periods include: early morning and late evening, as the sun is at it’s lowest point and sunlight penetration is the least during this time of the day.

Not all walleyes will stay deep throughout the day, as there are times when the conditions are right, walleyes can be caught shallow.

One of these is on those very windy days as there’s a good chance that walleyes will move up shallow to feed in the on top of humps rock piles and sandbars.

Because the surface of the water is being rippled by the wind, reducing the sunlight’s penetration, it makes the shallow water areas more comfortable and walleyes will move up from the deep water to feed.

Another time that you’ll find walleyes shallow during the day would be when heavy winds are pounding into a point or shoreline.

With the wind hammering against a shoreline, a mud line is created, dramatically cutting light penetration along the shoreline.

It may seem hard to believe that even walleyes would be able to find bait in the muddy coming back off a shoreline.

Just because it’s muddy on the first couple of inches doesn’t mean that it’s that way the way to the bottom.

In many cases the water a foot or so below this mud line is cloudy or even clear allowing walleyes the opportunity to move up during the day and feed.

In a river, fish will also be in the deepest holes or in shallower areas where there’s heavier current as this cools and oxygenates the water making it a more hospitable environment for walleyes.

During the heat of the summer in a river, an increase or decrease in water, will cause fish to make sudden location changes that anglers can take advantage of.

With a drop in water levels, fish will be forced into the remaining deep holes, concentrating them in smaller areas.

If there’s an increase in water flow, fish will move up stream, up against the sandbars and shallower to feed, taking advantage of the new influx of baitfish and other aquatic creatures that are being flushed into the system.

The Dog Days of summer usually mean deep-water presentations, but under the right conditions, walleyes can be shallow giving anglers the opportunity to fish them with bottom bouncers and spinners, Lindy Rigs or by pitching jigs and crankbaits.

These days, Dad needs help getting in the boat. He may even need help baiting his hook, tying lines, and cleaning weeds off. Just like I did many years ago. Now it is my turn to ensure that he has a great experience. Dad can’t stand and cast, trolling works best for him now. He still loves the tug of a fish on the end of his line. It is a joy for me to watch the pleasure fishing brings to him.

Maybe your dad is no longer alive? Take someone else’s dad. We have an organization in Minnesota called Let’s Go Fishing with seniors. Thanks to groups of volunteers, thousands of seniors get to go out on the water in safe pontoons to once again enjoy the great outdoors. To get more information, go to www.lgfws.com.