Brian Bollnow and his good friends Jim Luther and Eric Novak showed up bright and early this morning with high hopes and good spirits. I guess that will happen after getting a good nights sleep at the nearby Best Western.
This would be Brian and Jim's second trip with me and they were definitely looking forward to learning some new tricks for catching walleyes and/or crappies. We never did spend any time chasing crappies today.
The walleyes didn't bite fast and furious either and as a result, we ended up trying several different tactics including jig & crawlers, crank baits and night crawler rigs. The jig & crawlers put at least one keeper in the boat and Jim lost what appeared to be a big fish while trolling shad raps but the technique that finally paid off the best today was slow trolling crawler rigs.
We spent time working the crawler rigs in a couple of different areas just hoping for a walleye or sauger to show up and give the location of more fish away. That's pretty much exactly what happened too!
The first fish we caught on the crawler rigs was only 9" long, but by continuing to work over that area, we were able to entice another walleye, and then another and little by little, the guys started putting together a decent days catch. By the end of the day, a total of 15 walleyes and saugers came in the boat. Only seven of which were legal to keep but still fun none the less.
I've got to hand it to these three guys. Not only did they never lose faith, but they seemed to pretty much expect that we were indeed going to end up catching fish. And when the fish weren't biting, that just gave them plenty of time to crack jokes and pick on each other.
For me, guiding is the most fun when I get a group of guys like these three. They love to fish and no matter what happens, they're going to have a good time on the water. Catching plenty of fish is just a bonus.
Thanks again guys!
Boog
