Outdoorsmen Adventures.com

Reprinted from the Sioux City Journal

It was a quiet, late November afternoon when Ron Peterson, publisher of the Journal walked into my office in the newsroom.

He sat in the chair across from my desk where, as editor of the newspaper, I was scanning our news budget before heading up the meeting with the floor editors to decide what the next day’s paper would look like.

“What would you think of producing an outdoor tabloid which we distribute free throughout our area?” he asked.

As the paper’s outdoor writer since 1973, it didn’t take long for me to answer.

“I think it would be a great idea,” I said.

And so it started, a free tabloid devoted to teaching Siouxlanders more about hunting and fishing in our area and throughout the upper Midwest.

The first issue, one of six to be published each year, hit the streets in late January of 2004.

The cover photo was of Dave Genz, known as the father of modern day ice fishing. He was on the ice holding a walleye. I had taken that photo a year earlier on Devil’s Lake in North Dakota.

The whole issue was devoted to ice fishing .… Continue reading

Reprinted from the Sioux City Journal

WEBSTER, S.D. — A heavy overcast threatened rain and an occasional sprinkle emphasized that fact.

But when Tim Chandler, Watertown, S.D., guided his boat around the north side of Duck Island the graph lit up with arches signalling lots of fish below, thoughts of rain were forgotten. We attached number five Salmo Hornets to our trolling rods and began the search for walleyes.

We were on sprawling Waubay Lake, a walleye factory for the past several years.

It was once a duck slough but an infusion of water throughout northeast South Dakota in the early 90s turned it into a 16,000-acre fishing paradise

The lake more than quadrupled its size in the past decade and swallowed up many smaller lakes to create a massive fishery nine miles long and five miles wide.

It has receded somewhat from its high levels set in July of 1999. It has a maximum depth of 35 feet.… Continue reading

Here’s the best walleye fishing tip you will get all week.

Grab a handful of 2-ounce bottom bouncers and some spinners, a couple dozen crawlers and head for Lake Francis Case.

Troll the mud flats at 1 1/2 to 2 miles an hour and you will catch more walleyes than you ever thought possible.

The mud flats won’t be hard to find. Just look for the concentration of boats.

Memorial Day weekend signals the beginning of some fantastic walleye fishing on this big reservoir. But, it could be Big Spirit Lake, East Okoboji Lake, Storm Lake or any number of other walleye waters within driving range.

The bottom bouncer and live bait rig will be the way to go all summer long.

When word of this unique fishing sinker first came out in the late 1970s, a lot of old walleye hands sneered at this awkward- looking wire with a big hunk of lead on it.

The Lindy Rig was king at the time. That meant a small, maybe 3/8-ounce, sinker which slid along the line so you could feed line to wary walleyes. Fish something like this on those windswept Minnesota walleye lakes? No way.… Continue reading

Summertime walleye fishing throughout the area is really pretty simple.

Just fish them in shallow water. Or fish them in deep water.

Well, that’s not really the case but I did want to get your attention.

In lakes such as Spirit Lake in northwest Iowa, you’ll find a lot of walleyes in the weedbeds this time of year. Look for cabbage beds or mats of coontail on the flats and you can rest assured that walleyes will be taking advantage of this shade and cover and can be caught.

On the other hand, rest assured there will be plenty of walleyes cruising the main lake basin which in this lake bottoms out at about 22 feet or so. There will be no structure, just a flat, dishpan shaped muddy bottom for the most part.

In reservoirs such as Lake Francis Case, Lake Sharpe or Lewis and Clark Lake on the Missouri River system, walleyes will be scattered throughout flooded trees in the deeper Francis Case or cruising the old river channel in the shallower Sharpe and Lewis and Clark lakes. In these lakes you will need to get down to 30 feet or so to reach the fish.

There’s a method of fishing deep walleyes which has been growing in popularity the past few years. There are few walleye crankbaits that will dive to these depths, most bottom out at somewhere from 12 to 18 feet. There is, however, an easy method to take these crankbaits to the deeper walleyes where walleyes are cruising in July and August.

It’s called snap weight fishing. It involves attaching a heavy sinker in front of your crankbait by means of a line release similar to those used in deep water salmon fishing.

In a nutshell, here’s how it works.… Continue reading