Northwest Fishing Reports

I still consider myself a newby walleye fisherman. Last weekend I was able to pick up a few wally's at Crow Butte with the classic bottom walker rig but everyone keeps telling me about this new style of trolling for walleyes. Does anyone have any information on good walleye spots/information on crankbaits for walleye?

Most anyplace you can fish for wally, you can use crankbaits. My biggest wally came on a spinnerbait = 6 12, and the next biggest came on a crankbait = about 3 lbs..

what kind of crankbaits do you use though?

Bass plugs.

when the old worm harness wasn't working we'd use a number of different plugs. Anything by Rapala, Reef Runners, Rebels, and just this weekend my dad and a buddy got a bunch of Salmo plugs. The bigger lip models seem to work the best was walleye hang out close to the bottom so you generally want to go deep (but not necessarily always).

The thing with walleye is that they can be very finicky. If you know there are fish around, keep trying different things until you find what works. I've had days where all they'd bite on is salmon spoons!

Walleye can be caught on almost any lure, at one time or another. Crankbaits for Walleye is OLD SCHOOL, not new.

For example, using a three way swivel, you can drag stick baits like a Rapala Floater and do very well. Walleye love the long thin profile.

You can troll with deep divers, like the Reef Runner, or the Seible Coolie Minnow. Again, notice the long and thin, it is a pattern that works for me.

I like to cast the shallows a lot, digging into the bottom a bit, with crawdad patterns in the Bomber Model A, etc., when they are shallow.

I would try to stay away from the "Fat A or Big O" style of bass plugs, but otherwise, lures are not designed for a specific fish, but for a specific technique. What will catch a SMB will catch a Walleye, when the Walleye are shallow enough or if the lure will go deep enough.

Hint, the River2Sea Wooden Minnow, 6+ inches, dives to less then 4 feet, was a great Walleye lure for night fishing in Roosevelt. You just had to know when the fish would be shallow. River2Sea does not make them anymore, but I have 6 left.

Second Hint, unless you have baitfish that suspend, Walleye are going to be close to the bottom. That is where the crankbait needs to be also.

THester,
Hot lips and Shad-Raps are good to start with.
You can get a #7 Shad-Rap to hit bottom at 15 feet and the Hot lips will get a bit deeper.
They also make the Hot lips with an extended lip that will hit bottom at 30 feet.

If you want to get serious about pulling plugs, you need to get a line counter reel and an 8.5 ft trolling rod. Cabela's sells a Gold Label combo for not too much. There is also a book you can get called "Precision Trolling" that tells you what plugs run what depths when trolled at a certain speed with x amount of line out. For example, one of my favorite plugs for walleyes is a Rapala shad rap in size 5 or 7. Trolling at 2 mph with 100 feet of line out will get it down to about 9 feet deep if I remember right. The website for the book is www.precisionangling.com. The author is Mark Romanack who has done quite well on the PWT trolling plugs for walleye. Hope that helps.

Lots of good info and hints here, I will add that the rapala original floating lures are great for 3 way rigs and also behind bottom walkers. That allows for precision depth control. You can long line troll these in shallow water at night as well. I would also suggest using Berkley Flicker Shads they are a bit less expensive than rapalas or others and work great for walleye either casting or trolling. With 10lb flouro at 70' of line they will get to 11' drop to 120' and they will get down to 13-14' trolling at 1.7-2.2 mph. This lure is on fire right now at Banks and I had great success on Moses with it.

Line counter reel and pole setup takes the guess work out of setting your lures but you can do it with a casting or spinning combo. Just figure out how much line you pull out with a sweep of the rod and count how many sweeps you need for the amount of line needed to acheive the depth you want.