These past several days sure felt a lot like to Spring to me! The walleye bite continues to shine with a few big fish coming to the boat each trip. The number the past couple outings have been down a bit to around 12-15 fish compared to where it was a week ago or so, but never the less the size of the fish are making up for it in nice fashion!
Saturday the forecast was projected to have light winds and mild temps. When you hear that in January, its as about as loud of a cabin fever wake up call as your going to get.
So, Saturday morning found Dave Smith and his friend “Finny” joining me for a little mid-winter Pool 2 pig hunting. Dave and his buddy Finny had wagering wars back and forth for the first fish and the biggest. After a couple good old fashioned humorous jabs at each other Finny scored with a nice walleye that hit the tape at 27-1/2” long and an estimated weight of 8#+! Nice fish Finny and congrats on your biggest trophy to date! I sense a form of revenge coming down the road in the not too far future from Dave. Shortly after Finny boated that beauty, I stepped up and got lucky and boated a nice 28-1/2” fish as well. As you can see from these photos and previous reports, these fish are about as far away from starving as possible!
Saturday afternoon, Mark Elert joined me for a little one on one! The bite was not fast and furious for us during the afternoon, but once again the right fish found our 3/16th oz BFT’s precision jigs and YUM 4” ribworms. Recently I have found that once I find the area in which these walleyes are holding on a piece of structure, I am more opt to anchor the boat on the shoreline side (or inside) of that target and throw out into the current a bit and slowly work the jig back. This gives me optimum control of the jig pulling the jig against the current being thrown out from the Wingdam. Once you find the right depth and jig size for that particular target area, you can nearly hover your jig in place motionless and let the walleyes hunt down your offerings. Mark and I each shared a nice big brute for the trip with a pair of walleyes both topping the scales at a tad over the 9 pound mark. Nice fish Mark and congrats on your biggest walleye to date!
Not sure on how long this weather will hang around for us, but one thing is for sure the big fish are around and willing to bite if you are persistent and have confidence in your approach. I wish everyone the best of luck out there and remember that this is a precious fishery and it deserves the utmost respect from all of us anglers. Take a quick photo and get those beautiful creatures back in the water! Remember that Pool 2 is a catch and release fishery for all walleye/sauger and saugeye. See you on the water!
Steve, you continue to amaze us with those brutes! Keep ’em coming!
Nice fish DeeZee! What a great winter for the river and I can see why you’ve hung your auger and portable!
Nice going Steve!
Once again, a great report and informative too! 
Steve, thanks for the report and great pics. wow, just amazing. keep up the good work.
Jack..
To use the phrase from another…those are “onion eyes”. They bring tears to my eyes just looking at them!
Hope you had your anchor light on at sunset!!!
Very nice looking walleyes
I was able to get out Sunday evening and enjoy the snow falling on Pool 2. As a novice with this whole wingdam fishing technique, I have a lot to learn but did manage a nice 20″ fish just after it got dark…enough to keep the appetite whetted…and stick with it. Got to keep learning more with each trip.
Your pics keep me motivated to get on the water.
Nice job!!!
Very Nice Fish!
Steve,
Thanks for some great fishing, an education, AND the biggest walleye I’ve caught to date.
To Everyone Else,
), but Steve is patient and explains in detail, without holding anything back, what the fish are doing in the system, how to work the lure, etc. in a friend-to-friend fashion. 
AND you will catch fish, and probably some real pigs – these fish are beautiful, and they all go back for all to enjoy again. What a deal! Keep up the good work Steve!
I highly recommend a guide trip with Steve: he is a humble gentleman and a master of his trade. Someone who has his kind of fishing knowledge and skill could be very cocky (we’ve all been around “pros” who can’t hear themselves enough and it’s no fun
Hey Steve nice Hawgeyes. I went fishing with you last year and learned alot but I still have questions. I was out last nigth and caught a few at dusk but the bite stopped. I noticed all the pictures were taking in the dark and I also know your favorite color during the day. Do you switch to a brighter color at night or do anything different when its dark.
Steve- I dropped you a pm, not sure if you got it, but I was wondering what depth these fish are in and what your advise is on how not to lose a bunch of jigs on the wingdams. Are there any good wingdams south of the access you would recommend?
Thanks
Steve’s away on vacation for the week.
The best way to avoid losing a bunch of jigs is to have a variety of weight jigs available and rigged on different rods. Make a cast with a 3/16th. If you hang up briefly a couple times, drop the 3/16th and reach for the 1/8th. IF you struggle to have jig control with the 3/16th, up-size to the 1/4.
The difference 1/16th of an ounce can make to your presentation is staggering.
Oh yeah… and some of Steve’s fave dams are south of the landing… but if I tell you where he’d call me names and stuff like that.
Awesome fish Steve
I hope your having a great vacation. 
Steve are you coming down to Madtown for the fishing expo the end of Feb?
Thats bud, are these active fish on top of the wingdams or what types of depths. We through jigs to the top of some wingdams by the airport. They seemed to top out at about 5-6 feet. Is that right? or should we be looking to deeper areas? Not sure if you are getting a cut on the ring worms I bought the other day at Gander, but if you are you should be happy we lost about 40 jig/worms to the top of the wingdams in a couple hours. Darn frustrating is what that is!!! I think a good river guy has to have a lot more tallented then a good lake angler.
Once you get the hang of pitching jigs to wingies you’ll cut that down significantly. Most nights fishing wiht DeeZee we’re likely to lose 1 – 3 jigs per person, on average. There’s always some extra nasty dams that like to eat jigs though.
Generally speaking, active fish will be on top of the dam or right in front of the dam at the base. Fish can and will be found all over the dam but these are the high percentage areas for active fish.
H20 right on top of things. Thanks
Cool thanks much. I see you don’t sleep either, guess that is why you seem to be built for night fishing.
Trust me, I’d like to be sleeping right now. Duty calls.
Eyesfishing, there is an incredible fishing tutorial on what this wingdam and river fishing is all about. It is available here on the site, starring Mr. James Holst and some guy named Dustin
.
Your questions are great ones and I found myself asking the same ones about 2 years ago. But I found a couple ways to cut the learning curve way down. Here are a few things you can do, to help you cut that learning curve way down and make your time on the water way more productive.
1) To hire Mr. Dezurik if you like Pool 2, Mr. Tuckner if you like Pool 3, Mr. Holst if you like Pool 4, or Jarrad (Fireflick) Pool 5. What ever is your favorite pool, there is someone here to help you cut the learning curve. The knowledge and information that these guys are willing to share on guide trips is phenomonal. I have been in 3 of these guys boats on some body of water and I learned more in one day in the boat with one of these guys than I would have in months of fishing. So that little guide fee to me was way worth the money and a great investment.
2) Order the Video here on Mastering River Plastics as mentioned before. This is a great educationl tool for the begginer and novice river angler. I still watch it a few times a year. CLICK HERE to bring you to the page to order it.
3) Or your last option, you could do like I did and do both 1 & 2
.
Good Luck
Hey eyefishing,
Everything Lip Ripper suggested is certainly gonna help you have more fun if you intend to keep fishing wingdams, and I hope you do because it’s tons of fun! I did some simple math on the number of jigs you’ve said you lost, and at that rate, 26 days and you could’ve hired a guide and got the video to boot.
I’d suggest ordering the video, go back out and try some of James and Dustin’s suggestions and tips, if you’re still having some trouble give one of the fellows Lip Ripper mentioned a call and book a trip….You will be darn glad ya did. 
Good Luck to you, hope you hang in there.
I was out last night and thought I’d mention that the water is a little dirtier and the flow is a little higher. I expect these conditions won’t last long. There was a electrofishing boat out last night (presumably DNR) … did anyone talk to them after they were fishing? Or know of another way to find out what they found? I talked to them before they left (it was tough not to as my dog jumped in their boat) but I didn’t see them after that.
John
Imagine that
Yah, Mike. I left him in the truck with the windows rolled down while I was launching. As soon as I started the boat and moved away from the trailer he got mad. He jumped out of the window, thought about swimming out to me, and then decided it might be a better idea to try to hitch a ride with the DNR. Smart dog???
Anyway, he’ll settle down as he gets older. He sits next to me while I cast for about half the time now … the other half is spent running around the boat looking at EVERYTHING. 
He’ll have better boat manners by the time duck season opens, I guarantee it! 
Good because after what I saw down on the lower end of P2 this fall when I fished with you makes me want to settle down in one of those shallow sloughs and torch some quackers
Shhhhhhhhhh…