Tips from the trail: walleye tournament winners talk early season tactics

Early season walleye can be full of action. Post-spawn giants can be on the hunt to make up for the meals they skipped during spawn. It can also be a bust. Big winds, cold water, bug hatches and the post-spawn recuperation period can make it so that it’s hard to find fish, stay on fish or get them to bite. “One of the most frustrating things is thinking that you know where a big school should be and not being able to find them,” says Eric Labaupa. Labaupa, with his wife Divine, won the Falcon Lake Walleye Masters Cup in Manitoba, in early June last year. For tournament anglers like Labaupa, there’s more than fun on the line. They’ve paid their entry fee to compete, and they are looking for a win. For those who opt in to tournament trails like the Central Walleye Trail (CWT), their results can also affect their standings for the season. The best competitors are going to fish smarter. They aren’t going to waste time. They aren’t going to compromise because of conditions. And because of it, they are usually going to catch more and better fish – even when spring conditions get tough. “The year we won at Rafferty, it was a 70 km/h wind and two inches of rain,” says Karen Soke. She, with her partner Lance Marcotte, won the first annual Rafferty Reservoir Walleye Cup near Weyburn, Saskatchewan in May of 2015. They also won CWT Team of the Year in 2017. “We were fishing in that full wind – because we knew that’s where we could catch ‘overs’ (big fish).” Accomplished tournament anglers have some tried-and-true practices for finding success with early season walleye. Here are a few key considerations from some of the CWT’s top anglers that can help catch more walleye in both competitive and fun-fishing situations. 1. Do your research, on and off the water “My partner, Evan, had spent some time studying a quality map, and had found some areas which he felt could possibly hold fish,” says Jason Woychuk. Woychuk won the CWT’s Angler of the Year award in 2017, and came in second at Falcon Lake last year, just behind Labaupa. “A large part of our success was because of the time he spent looking at the map and narrowing down areas to focus on,” says Woychuk. “Before we go to the water, we will even start by looking at Google Earth,” says Marcotte. “We’re looking for clues on any depth we can get – and then we drive around and map those areas with our Humminbird. Electronics are a big part of it.” 2. Don’t be just another face in the crowd Community spots – places where many people fish, often – are popular for a reason. They usually have characteristics that hold fish. But they are not always the best option. “I try to hit areas and water that no one else is fishing,” says Labaupa. “I will hit community spots as well, but I prefer not to commit too much time huddled with a group of other boats. During practice sessions, I will touch those spots and make an assessment in a relatively short period of time.” “The fishing pressure can be giant at those spots, and the fish get pressured so much that they can move or stop biting,” says Soke. “To me, you need to look and watch what other boats are doing. But then you have got to find your own spots.” 3. Fish the conditions Heavy wind might sound like something to avoid. But anglers like Labaupa know they can use it to their advantage. “The wind was blowing steadily all morning against a section of shoreline that was on my radar, so we decided it was the right time to hit it,” says Labaupa, referring to tournament day at Falcon Lake in 2017. “Casting along one side produced no bites at all, but when I backtracked and went in the other direction, we hooked into a perfect walleye right away. We went on to catch well over two dozen walleye in the next hour there.” Any time of year, wind can help by pushing in baitfish and other forage to attract walleye. It can also blow in more than just food. “That wind can push warmer water in. That gets everything active, especially in spring,” says Marcotte. In the early season, the water is warming toward temperatures that walleye find most comfortable. Even a small temperature difference can be noteworthy in finding active fish. “When I arrive at one of these lakes or reservoirs in a springtime situation, the very first thing I note after launching the boat is the water temperature,” says Labaupa. “I keep track of the water temperature as we travel to different areas of the lake and always note it when we catch or mark fish. It plays a large part in developing a pattern that I can use come game time.” Another environmental factor to watch for in spring is insect hatches. There’s little that can change a bite as much as a feast of bugs, rising from the bottom. “On tournament day, Evan and I started fishing in an area that had produced while pre-fishing. We thought it had potential to produce a big fish,” says Woychuk. “We did mark some fish, but we could see that overnight there was a large mayfly hatch at that area, and the mayflies were winning the battle.” In that situation, there are two main options: work at “matching the hatch” to present like the natural forage…or make like Woychuk did, and move. 4. Don’t waste your time Experienced anglers have a pretty good idea of what the fish “should” be doing at any given time of year. But the fish don’t always agree. And that’s when it’s time to move. “For us it’s a matter of covering a lot of ground to determine where and what type of structure and locations we should focus on,” says Woychuk. “It’s also important for us to keep moving until we figure out a pattern,” says Marcotte. “In spring, they are often shallow. But they can be anywhere from two to 27 feet deep.” Whether you’re in a tournament or not, that fishing time is precious. Waiting out a slow spot, hoping the fish will show up, is not an approach most tournament anglers take – unless they have studied up on the time of the bite. “You can figure out the times of the bites. In a tournament, we might have three different bites that are time-specific. But still, we may only be on that spot for 15 minutes,” says Marcotte. 5. Don’t be afraid to leave biting fish Rafferty Reservoir is known for having lots of walleye, but few large ones. When Soke and Marcotte won in 2015, their third fish of the day weighed 7 lb. – the largest fish weighed-in at that tournament to-date. They credit the catch with focusing on finding “tournament-quality” fish rather than being satisfied with catching big numbers. “We saw lots of other teams catch 100 fish that day, but all small. We only caught 10 fish all day. Our first five fish were big enough to win that tournament,” says Marcotte. Sometimes that means leaving a spot when only small ones are there. It’s a gamble, but in spring especially, larger female walleye may choose different areas than the smaller males. 6. Fish what you know For all that might be similar among tournament anglers, lure choices often differ. One angler’s go-to springtime presentation may be a fast fishing swimbait. For another, it may be finesse fishing live bait. Another still may choose spinners or minnow-style crankbaits. “It is no secret that I prefer to cast and retrieve plastics for walleye all throughout the open water season,” says Labaupa. “There is no time that this presentation is more effective than in the springtime. Using artificials gets the aggressive fish to show themselves quicker and I can cover water very quickly.” “Those Manitoba anglers use way too big of lures,” laughs Soke. Her team is known for fishing small jigs, tipped with bait like leeches. “We start at 1/8 ounce and downsize from there.” At any given time, walleye can be doing – and feeding on – a multitude of things within the same body of water. That means there isn’t one guaranteed presentation to win the day. By starting with a bait that has already won their confidence, and makes sense with local forage, tournament anglers are presenting a bait they will fish with precision and patience – a bait they will fish smarter. Whether the bite is furious or frustrating, few fishing tournaments are won by chance. Competitive anglers make the most of their limited time, to learn the water and use conditions to their advantage. And at the end of any day on the water, be it competitive or not, the angler who takes the smart approach is more likely to land the better fish. To learn more about walleye tournaments or tournament trails, visit www.centralwalleyetrail.com. Originally published in Wild Guide magazine, Spring 2018 issue.