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Howdy,
I am new to Utah and am looking to catch some walleye. I read there are some in Willard bay but I do not have a boat. I have basic spincast tackle. Not sure if you can shore fish successfully for walleye. Would anyone happen to have room on their boat or a boat for rent? Also, advice to get started like tackle and technique is also appreciated.
The wipers sound fun too.
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stop at Smith & Edwards, get ya some 1/8 oz gig heads (orange) a pack of chartreuse grub tails and a pack of white grubs and just walk along the north west dike and cast along the rocky shore line. bump the rocks with the gig as you real it back to ya . try fishing a hour before dark..
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I just got a boat this year and have been fishing there quite a bit, I'm not an expert but I have managed to catch quite a few walleye. I should have some room in the boat if you want to tag along sometime. Shoot me a pm!
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Couldn't find orange jig head in town. S&E was closed. Tried a variety of jigs, spinners, crank-baits. I caught one Crappie on a worm and bobber. My wife got a Crappie and a small Wiper. We didn't move too far down the dyke tho. Stayed out till 12:30am.
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Try using a bleeding shad rattle trap, or other lipless crank baits and just cast them along the rocks. We had awesome last time using them.
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I can give you a good spot to walk into. It's a walk, but it is in my opinion the best place to catch Walleye from the dike this time of year. Try the east side. North of the feed lot. It is accessible by walking over the canal by means of a rickety 2 x 8 plank. Walk south until you see the shallow water bouy. Fish north of that bouy about 200 yards. Pink, Orange, black, or white jig heads. 3 inch white Berkeley power grubs are some of my favorites. I sometimes make my own castable worm harness complete with spinners blades as well. Plain Jane silver blades will get you started. Sometimes tipping your jig with a half a worm helps. It is a long walk, any where along that dike is good right now. The north dike can be great on windy days like the next couple of days ahead. Early mornings are prime-time. Late evening find the wipers moving in. There are some single and double boils starting right now be prepared for them as well. A silver and blue spoon is he way to attack those boils from shore. Casting distance is superb and being able to hit the boil is usually more important then the type of lure.
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Thanks for the advice! I don't think I can get my wife to go the long walk, she is 6 mo pregnant. I will definately try the areas you suggested. I did some similar attempts yesterday. I have a lipless rattle trap but go figure, its the one thing I bought yesterday and didn't try. I am a little new, what is a boil? It was pretty windy yesterday, I thought surely that would blow the minnows in, but no dice.
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I would like to try the boat fishing out, instead of walking the whole thing. I wasn't sure if Jordan was going out tomorrow, but you are Jmaze? What time do you typically start?
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I don't know if I'll make it out tomorrow but I'm probably going to be out there all next weekend.
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I love lipless crank-baits as well, not so much form shore though at the rate I loose them. Jigs are cheaper. I usually Head out before sunrise and with the wind plan on getting off before noon, and depending on the fish, before 10. The wipers are going better in the evening, but there will be plenty of them in the morning as well. The boils are when wipers are chasing schooling shad to the surface, and when there are enough wipers/shad the water appears to be "boiling". Hence boils.
The canoe I fish from sometimes necessitates me not even launching dependent on wind and waves. The wind against the north dike can be a great thing to the fishing. Problem is moving along the dike casting a lot on large ankle snapping slippery rocks with water blowing in your face and... Well you get the picture.
I am still open to a Sunday foray if you don't mind sitting in a canoe for a couple hours. Should be a limit of walleyes or 2 still around with the odd Smallies, carp, wiper, crappie, etc.. I would require only that you supply 2 dozen worms. I can meet you anywhere from Ogden North as if I am headed there anyways. The gas is my own regardless in that direction. I have a good selection of lures and can loan you any tackle you might want to try.
Every day is a new day to fishing, so don't feel remotely inhibited by being less experienced. It makes it easier when you get skunked! [  ] Especially as often as I get Skunked! Shoot me a PM if you are still interested.
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Sunday was somewhat of a slow day on Willard bay but it was rewarding. I got a walleye and a kitty. Jmaze got two eyes, a kitty, and a nice wiper. I forgot to take the bloody photos of the fish we caught. I had the camera out and everything and was so focused on leaning how to clean walleye. I am an expert now =).
My wife and I had a fish fry with walleye, wiper, and crappie (all from Willard bay). I took three eggs from our backyard chickens and mixed it with a cup of milk. I put a cup of flour into a ziplock, tsp of sea salt, fresh cracked pepper (my own mix of black, green, pink, and coriander), old bays, sage, and thyme. I then dried fish, dipped in egg, and shake-n-bake breaded in the bag. Fried hot but not high in an inch of oil. Dill relish/real mayo for dipping. They were all very good. Crappie was fishy and light. Wiper was firm but a little bland. Walleye was a medium between the two. The cheeks didn't taste much different but it was fun to try.
I burned the crap out of my knees and me fishing hand but it was worth it. Made props to Jmaze for taking me out and showing me the ropes. I look forward to doing it again.
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What did you catch them on if you don't mind me asking?
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Everything was caught bottom bouncing. Worm harnesses with silver blue blades. I had a 5 to 1 bite ratio. Missed a ton of fish. The wind sure did not help either.
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Jmaze had a lot more hits than me. The few I got it was very hard to set the hook on em. I had troubles keeping the bottom bouncer at the correct depth. Let me know if you want to go out Jordan, Jmaze taught me a lot; I can try to emulate. But you probably know more than me.
Typo in last comment "Mad props to Jmaze for showing me the ropes" or whatever.
I read in another post that they started biting good after sunset. I wonder if the heat is driving them much deeper than we went Jmaze?
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Nice! Everyone seems to be doing good on the blue/silver harness. Where are you buying them though? I've looked 3 or 4 different places and no one has blue. I'm considering buying plain ones and painting them.
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Wipers in particular are very susceptible to dawn and dusk. Walleye are VERY good night biters. Night fishing at Willard is getting tougher with the gate situation. About this time of year I like to start night fishing. If you noticed those beads on you bouncer glowed... Lots more trickery to the Walleye fishing. On top of the quality of fishing at night the weather can be much nicer, the bugs.... Well... They can be worse... I have even caught the odd wiper or 2 at night along with lots o cats. If you noticed the average size of the cats has gone down, along with the quantity. The canoe is so limited by the weather sometimes. Oh well the worst day fishing is better then the best day working. This week looks horrible if a storm really does come in. Willard is not the place to be caught in a storm.
As to them being driven deeper? Could be especially this time of year. But the surface temps were not over 70 so I just don't know. If we fished south we would have wondered over to some deeper waters to test that theory. At night he shad come off the bottom to feed in plankton rich waters. And the Walleye certainly do follow. I did have a few friends go out later on Sunday and tell me the wiper fishing was a hit even after the sun went down. My apologies, but there are a lot of short comings in the canoe. Most unser mountable.
Still always willing to hit it up as long as it is not a post front day!
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As for blades Sportsmans warehouse had some, the last few I got were from cabelas. Painting them blue is a fine idea just make sure you purchase the right paint. It has to be semi-translucent and if you over apply it effects the blades spin pattern of the blade pretty negatively. On top of hat make sure the paint is water proof and can bind to metal. Those little bottles of paint can cost you locally a couple of bucks. I would shoot tube dude a pm to see if he knows the best place to get paints. Probably online is your best choice. My blades were technically red silver and blue. I always do better on weekdays fishing just because there are less people and that means more fish per area. This year it seems there are scads of Walleye everywhere. There's a pic of my favorite blade attached. Good luck!
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[cool][#0000ff]Custom painting blades is easy. The trick is finding a good translucent blue that will hold on the slick nickle finish. Actually, for short term use you can use a good permanent marker.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]There are also some special paints advertised for painting blades and metal lures. I have tried them and they work. But unless you apply an epoxy coating over the finish it scratches off easily.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Most paints available for lure painting are opaque and will not produce the effect you want. The best one for creating a translucent color are the Electroflect vinyl paints from [url "http://www.barlowstackle.com/Vinyl-Fishing-Lure-Paint-Electroflect-Colors-P959C132.aspx"]BARLOWS[/url]. They are only available in 4 oz. bottles...at about $10...but if you make a lot of lures they really produce a good color over either bare metal or over glitter. I use them a lot to get some special colors on both spinner blades and crank baits. Also a good idea to apply clear epoxy over the paint for longer lasting. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff][/#0000ff][inline ELECTROFLECT.jpg]
[#0000ff]In the attached pic below you can see the blue back color applied over silver hologram glitter...on a crank that caught one of my walleyes (whoops) last week.[/#0000ff]
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Awesome! Thanks for the info, I'll have to try it out. I'm making a trip down to cabelas tomorrow so hopefully they have something there to hold me over until i can make my own.
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