The following article discusses wind / current with regards to
walleye fishing; however these same locations, and traits
apply to Esox fishing as well. Tim Mead is a professional outdoor writer.
As we motored back to camp, Warren Johnson debated with himself whether we caught 68 or 70 walleyes in a 6-hour period. Warren, a retired professor from Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, joined me on a mid-summer trip to northwestern Ontario. While there were a number of other folks fishing the same lake we were, they were not having the same debate. While we had constant action, they reported catching few walleyes and smaller ones than we caught.
Springtime walleyes are relatively easy to find. Spawning fish concentrate in large groups near incoming streams or shallow shoals. Lots of fish in small areas. In the period after the spawn, however, walleyes scatter across a variety of haunts all over the lake or reservoir. With lots of water to cover, walleyes may be hard to find. Anglers on summer vacation with a family in tow may not have time to roam a large body of water.
Further, during the dog days of summer, warmer water drives walleyes, particularly during daylight when most of us on vacation prefer to fish, deeper. Summer walleyes can be a tough gig. Yet there is a pattern that almost always works. Fish the windy shores. Fishing a windy bank, Warren and I caught quality walleyes all week. They ranged between 2- and 4-pounds with a 6-pound anchor. Truth is, I’ve used this mid-summer pattern throughout walleye country and it almost always pays off.
Why the windy bank?
Warren asked, "Why are they so thick here?" The explanation is all in physics. Wind pushes water across the surface of the lake. Below a couple of feet, the water is quite stationary as the surface layers move across the lake. When the waves crash against the bank, the water brought in by the wind has to go somewhere and it slides along the bottom back in the direction it came from. Waves against the bank stir up small critters, minnows and crayfish in particular. They are made more active as the moving water dislocates insects and other small forage that minnows and crayfish eat. In turn, depending on the force of the wind, the minnows and crayfish get tossed about and are more vulnerable to attack by walleyes.
Like other fish, walleyes orient themselves to the current, facing into it. On the windy bank, walleyes hover in the lower layer of water, the one carrying water away from the bank and toward the center of the lake. So the walleyes face the bank, not toward deeper water. Warren confirmed the orientation of the walleyes we were catching by noting, "We get more strikes when the lure moves away from the bank rather than toward it."
Wind also causes mixing of the upper layer of a lake. In summer, most lakes and reservoirs in North America stratify, with relatively warm water on the surface and cooler water below. While the lower layer is cooler, it also has low levels of dissolved oxygen and is thus unsuitable for fish. The division is called the thermocline. While walleyes may move below the thermocline to chase bait, they cannot stay long. The most productive water is just above the thermocline.
If the wind blows for several days in the same direction currents called the Langmuir Circulation are established. The Langmuir currents are easy to spot because long rows of bubbles or debris appear parallel to the wind direction. Without getting too technical, the Langmuir currents are caused by water piling up on one side of the lake and returning to the original side. In addition to the horizontal movement of the water, the Langmuir currents also cause vertical currents and on a large lake these vertical movements may be as much as 15-feet. The net effect for walleye anglers is to drive the thermocline deeper on the windy side of the lake making more water available for walleye foraging.
Strategy and tactics
Warren and I found walleyes by starting in a small cove where a creek came into the lake. We caught a few pike in pondweeds in the cove. As we moved out of the cove and toward a mile long bank, we began to catch walleyes. The walleyes were small at first and as we came to the windy bank, the walleyes got bigger and bigger. Since the walleyes seemed to be the most active fish, we began to concentrate our effort on them.
After a brief period of experimentation, including careful observation of the depth finder, we determined that the walleyes were principally between 8- and 11-feet deep. At one spot, Warren said, "Right there by that a small point, there are nice fish right close to the bank." On windy banks, points create eddies where waves crash against the shore at slightly different angles. Walleyes hang out in the slack water of the eddy, waiting for good fortune to toss a morsel in their direction. Once we determined where walleyes were concentrated, I tossed out a marker at the downwind end of the long bank. With the marker and trees on the far shore, I could keep the boat on a steady path across the most productive areas. Usually the boat was oriented diagonally, with the bow nearest shore and the stern toward deeper water.
While we could catch walleyes casting ahead of the boat, casting directly toward shore, an approach Warren often took from the bow, or behind the boat toward deep water, casting diagonally toward shore was most productive. A cast in the direction the boat was moving meant that it was more difficult to maintain contact between lure and rod tip. Walleyes are notorious for gentle strikes and without constant linkage between lure and angler, strikes are easily missed.
Basically, we caught walleyes on either of two presentations. Most of the time, we cast lead head jigs and plastic trailers. We used quarter ounce unpainted jigs. Lots of very successful walleye anglers have preferences for colored jig heads, but I have usually relied on unpainted ones. They’re cheaper.
A variety of plastic trailers worked. Tube grubs and curly tails, of course, are classic walleye offerings. There’s a good reason -- they work! But the walleyes Warren and I were fishing for were along the windy bank to feed aggressively and they hit plastics that imitated leeches, minnows, and non-descript offerings equally well.
When casting jigs and plastics, the most effective presentation was to let the lead head sink just above the rocky bottom, lift it gently a foot or so, and let it drop back, reeling in the slack at the top of the lift. Reeling in the slack helped maintain close contact with the lure. To detect strikes and set the hook effectively, an angle between the rod tip and line of about 30 degrees worked best.
The second effective presentation was to cast minnow-like crankbaits that dived to about 8-feet. Every now and then Warren would say, "I wonder if such-and-such would work." For a moment or two, he rummaged in his box and tied on another lure. As long as it looked like some sort of bait fish, dark on the back and silver sides, and would dive deep enough to reach the fish, Warren caught walleyes casting. In assessing his experiments, Warren concluded, "The crankbaits with a dark back and silver sides and a bright orange on the belly or gills seemed particularly attractive to feeding walleyes." Examples include Wally Diver, Shad Rap, Long A, Fat Free Shad, Hot Lips Express and others. Probably you have some in your box. Perhaps over the years I would be a better angler if I did more experimenting, but I hate to change a winning game. So I stuck to the lead heads and plastics.
Gear
We used typical walleye gear. Warren had a casting rig with a 6-foot medium action rod and reel and line to match. During the couple of times I tossed a crankbait I used a 6 and 1/2 foot baitcaster with a limber tip, and 12-pound test monofilament. With the lead head and plastics I used a 6 and 1/2 foot spinning rod, a matching reel, and 8-pound test monofilament. I use somewhat larger spinning reels relative to my rod than many. A spool with a larger diameter means less line twist. And I set my drag on spinning reels just tight enough to require that I backreel when a fish wants to take line. Backreeling, it seems to me, means that I’m in control rather than the fish when line is pulled off the spool. Not everyone does it.
Warren and I were not the only ones on the lake. There were others in our party who knew how we were catching walleyes and knew also that we were catching lots of quality fish. After a few tries, they decided it was not worth fighting the wind. And not far from where we were fishing, there was another cabin filled with anglers. In an email message to me after we got home, Warren said, "I often wondered if the guys in the cabin around the corner who were fishing on the other side of the lake knew what they could have had in their own backyard."
It was not mere accident that Warren and I found walleyes on the windy shore. Craig, my son, and I have often caught walleyes along the windy bank. Craig’s first trophy walleye, many years ago now, came off a windy point on a lake in Ontario’s Quetico Provincial Park. Wish I had a picture of the look on that kid’s face when he first saw the size of that fish!
When summer walleye fishing gets tough, don’t quit. Go to the windy bank, particularly if the wind has been from the same direction for several days. The fish will be there and you should be too.
Click the mailbox to e-mail. Last updated on ... November 17, 2007
