National Walleye Trail Lake Sharpe Pierre South Dakota And Personal Memories

The past week been following the practice for the lst event sounds like the contestants are finding the walleyes are in the middle of the spawn so a lot of small fish being caught, hard to find the larger females. Like me perhaps many of you have memories of fishing Lake Sharpe. One of mine is I was fishing a tournament on Sharpe the weekend after Easter. The boundaries were from dam to Antelope Creek. The Bad River was flowing with muddy water at the halfway point clouded the water from the Bad River Entrance south which cut the fishable area in half. A number of notable anglers competing plus the locals, no one found a walleye to weigh in. The prizes were given by drawing. That evening after the event a bunch of us were sitting outside our motel rooms, relaxing headed home in the morning. Within a block was another motel like ours the night before was full of tournament contestants which had left. Ron and AL Lindner stayed at this motel and on their way home fortunately. As we sat and enjoyed the evening, a explosion came from the motel and a huge fireball in the air. Later we found out there was a gas leak, and the motel exploded right in the middle killing the motels owner. Thankful it did not happen the night before the casualties would of been far worse

I have very fond memories of fishing on Sharpe.

33 years ago on Good Friday I caught this 32.5” walleye out there.
Me and a friend were 19 at the time and ran out there with his dad’s Lund Rebel with a 40 hp Evinrude.
I don’t think we were there 10 minutes and the fish bit my jig and minnow.

I had heard lots of small fish could be had for the tourney as well. Someone will find them and it will be interesting to see how it plays out.

Unique experience for me on Sharpe. I was around 10 years old, fishing out of a Chris Craft scorpion with my parents. No GPS, just a depth finder. My aunt, uncle and cousin (same age) were in there boat with a similar setup. Our boat had caught there limit, but it took another hour (always does) for the other boat to catch there’s. A storm blew in during that last hour. Dad claims 6 ft swells and low visibility. Out there it’s tough to find any landmarks. To this day I swear I recognized a something like a long wrapped hay bale that would have marked our boat landing, but I knew better than to tell my dad how to do things. Eventually my uncles boat ran out of gas and as were towing and it’s getting near dark, we accept well probably run out of gas too. Beach it on a random stretch of sand and head up towards what looks like a homestead. Unfortunately its abandoned, but we’re able to get enough signal to call the police and after hours of flashing our flashlights in the air they locate us. They take the women and children back to the hotel and the men spend the night out there watching the boats, fileting the fish, and finishing the warm beer (they used the ice for the fish). Police bring them gas the next day and they find the landing. Neat thing is we found out later that random ranch we ended up on was a film site for Dances With Wolves. My only lame claim to fame.

That is a dandy walleye congrats on the mount too. If I recall correctly Rick Ray landed a 14# class walleye in a tournament. Appreciate sharing your memory about Sharpe.

Heard the same as you a lot of small fish. They need to watch weights and lengths to as the longer fish are not the heaviest. How do you think the locals will do?

Full draw wrote:

I have very fond memories of fishing on Sharpe.

33 years ago on Good Friday I caught this 32.5” <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>walleye out there.
Me and a friend were 19 at the time and ran out there with his dad’s Lund Rebel with a 40 hp Evinrude.
I don’t think we were there 10 minutes and the fish bit my jig and minnow.

I had heard lots of small fish could be had for the tourney as well. Someone will find them and it will be interesting to see how it plays out.

That is a dandy walleye congrats on the mount too. If I recall correctly Rick Ray landed a 14# class walleye in a tournament. Appreciate sharing your memory about Sharpe.

Very neat experience. Glad you made out ok. Where is the farm stead, that Dancing with Wolves was filmed? How far down river …thanks for the memory

Day 1 leader has 21 lbs. second place is 13 lbs.
A lot of ground to make up for those trailing the leader.
I wonder how many big fish are in town? When I caught my big fish 33 years ago it was in town just down stream from the dam.