Now that the warmer temps are here and most ramps are open, today was a perfect day to get out and find some walleye and sauger. It turned out to be a great day for numbers, but nothing big came to the boat on this trip. The biggest walleye taped out at 18″.
The presentation for the day was vertical jigging as well as dragging. The 18″ walleye fell to a black/black Bucktail Wayne Hair jig with no minnow. In fact, I didn’t even bother with minnows today. Most of the fish came on a BFT Precision jig with one of three colors of ringworms. The colors of ringworms today were chart. pepper, catalpa orange, and cotton candy. While the sun was out the cotton candy and chart. pepper were awesome. When the clouds came out, the fish hit on the catalpa orange as well as the black hair jig. I also have my Marcum LX-3 with the puck transducer mounted to my trolling motor and I am very happy with its performance on open water as well as ice.
I never fished any deeper than 22 feet today. Most fish were concentrated in 20-22 fow. I did catch some smaller fish up shallower early in the day. Dragging worked well in the 20 fow with a 5/16 unpainted BFT Precision jig with chart.pepper. The flow is excellent right now as well as clarity. As far as floating ice chunks today, it was pretty much non-existant. Also, a little tip for this area right now. If you want numbers, head to the dam with a jig and minnow. If you want better quality fish, leave the minnows at home, grab some BFT Precision jigs and Ringworms, and don’t play bumper boats near the dam. South of the dam is where I spent all my time today and was happy with the results.
Thanks for the report Wats
.I cant wait to jump in the boat with you and pound some eyes this year 
.
Good to see your getting on fish Mike.
Ain’t it great to stay away from the crowd and work your own fish
Keep the reports coming
Looks like you had fun on the water today as well, Mike!
Great report, wasn’t today a wonderful day to be on the water?
Great report Mike. It was raining a good part of the day down here in Illinois, but am glad to hear it was dry to the north. Maybe the river will not muddy up too much before I get a chance to go chase ’em!
I’m glad you mentioned dragging in 20′. I had never thought of dragging that deep, but have a couple spots in mind that I most certainly will try now in that depth range!
John-I actually drag in those depths quite a bit in this area. For me, it is very effective. What is odd to me is how I can vertical jig the same area and pick up a few fish. Then if I drag the same area, there are times when I will pick up more and better fish. You obviously have to go with a heavier jig, but it works in the same way as in shallow water. Get it to where it is just off the bottom and slowly work up or downstream and hang on. I just love the feel of the fish hitting the bait while dragging in any depth. Most of the fish today had the ringworms all in their mouth, they must be hungry.
Great report Mike. Sounds like a blast. Great info on colors w/ and w/o sunshine. I will try to remember that this weekend… starting tomorrow!
Thanks for the report Mike…nice pics too! Looks like dinner is served!
Nice Report Wats
You get me angry, when you ar efishing and I’m not
Great report Wats. Them saugers are nice lookin’ also!
Good job Mike!
Way to go Wats
Sounds like you had a great day. Hopefully tomorrow will prove as productive for Bret and I. 
Lntony and myself got out again this afternoon. There were some big changes today. First, boat traffic was pretty high
But when it is this warm you expect it. Second, the flow was higher. The fish I was on yesterday moved from the 20-22 fow out to the deeper water. It took a little while to find the fish and once we did, you caught quite a few. Size today was also on the smaller size. We managed to keep 9 saugers today. Also, today was warmer and sunny the entire time we were out. Yesterday, it was mostly cloudy. The dominant color today was the Oystershell Ringworm on a Precision unpainted jig. One thing that I haven’t done very much of is fish after dark. We started dragging a little after dark and started getting fish right away. Most of the fish we caught after dark were walleyes. They were all cookie cutter 14″, but WOW, were they aggressive.