I have been extremely busy since my last walleye fishing report.  The bite has been great at times and also slow on others depending on the levels, clarity, and water temperature.   The only way you can know how it is is be out there trying to catch that fish.  
 

We have seen water temperatures all the way up to 52 degrees in my boat however after the last cold snap it dropped seven degrees back down to 45 degrees.  This will slow down the process of the spawn our walleye and sauger come out of Lake Pepin to do each spring.   Even this week of April 15 th we got into some really nice pre spawn walleye including Jeff Nymarks mamouth 11.64 pounder he got on Tuesday the 13 th.   What an amazing walleye you caught Jeff and your excitement when we netted it was why I love to guide folks on the mighty Mississippi River.  
 

Jeff was not the only gentlemen to get personal best fish in my boat the last couple weeks I also had Dean Robinson get two giant sauger in the same day. One weighing 4.05 in the morning and then beat that in the afternoon catching a 4.54 sauger in the afternoon.   Interesting that both of those were exactly 21 inches in length. what a great time Dean and the gang and I will see you in June Dean.

 On Thursday this week I had Greg and his son Alex join me and Alex got into his personal best walleye weighing in at 8 .05 pounds.   It was awesome to see the kids smile when he boated that persona walleye.  We boated several walleye on this date just pitching the current seems down the river.  
 

On April 5 th I had Ryan Denzer, Brian, and  Swanny join me, we did some jumping around on this date and got into several pods of walleye and sauger moving up the system.  Denzer boated the largest on this date measuring out at 25 inches. All our fish on this day were caught on Dubuque rigging in water depths from 9-21 foot.   We had to change speeds depending on what area we fished and the current speed.   It seemed if we marked the fish we caught them.  Fun time gentlemen and I will see you another day. 
 

Jerry, Jay and Terry and also Chad, have also joined me as of late.  On this date we did pretty good pulling cranks catching plenty of male walleye. Jay seemed to have the hot hand on this date boating plenty of walleye even after handing off his rod to the others and using theirs and proving its not the fishing rod.  Some days a guy just has the fish gods on his side .  It was fun to watch all three gentlemen boat fish on these dates and I look forward to our next outing guys. 

With the spawn dwindling down it will be time to change techniques soon.   Pitching eddies, pulling crawlers, leeches, chubs, and willow cats and trolling cranks will be the way to produce fish coming up here soon.  Technique will depend on the water conditions.  Our water levels will start to drop quickly real soon with the rains slowing down so adjustments each day will be needed. 
 

I personally like the river to stay at this level for a while but I can not control Mother Nature.  There is lots of debris floating down the system right now so be extremely careful out there.  There are starting to be more pleasure craft joining the fishermen on the river lately so make sure your paying attention at all time since you do notice they have a problem with this.  
 

Good luck guys and Gals!!!!  

Mississippi River, St. Croix River, Pool 3, Pool 4, Walleye Fishing, Sauger Fishing, Red Wing, Hastings