Springtime Spinners for Walleyes
 By
Keith Kavajecz and Gary Parsons

You might normally think of trolling for walleyes as a tactic reserved for the warmer days of summer. However, if you’ve watched our television series over the past couple of years, you’ve probably seen episodes where we were trolling for walleyes in the cold waters of April and May, and doing so pretty successfully. The key to successful trolling this early in the year is where you fish. Not all bodies of water will offer this type of pattern, but trolling open water in the early spring has allowed us to catch a bunch of really nice walleyes over the years. Two primary techniques stand out when early season trolling; one designed for a shallow water bite the other for a deeper, yet suspended fish bite. Although in the cases we’ll describe here we were fishing on Great Lakes waters, we know these tactics can be effective on any water with a strong open water forage base. The target is post-spawn walleyes looking to feed up and regain strength following their annual spawning ordeals.  That’s a scenario that plays out on many walleye waters across the country. 

On one of our early season trips a couple seasons back we were fishing on Lake Michigan’s Green Bay. It was early May, and the water temps were hovering in the forty eight to fifty two degree range. The walleyes had finished spawning in the rivers feeding the bay and begun their migration back to the big water, yet they weren’t quite ready to head for the deep water way off shore just yet. We found most of the biters cruising large shallow flats running six to eight feet deep, where the water was slightly warmer and the bait fish were plentiful. These weren’t super active walleyes, but they would bite, provided our presentation matched their mood. 

The pattern was to slow troll with spinners tipped with crawlers. And by slow, we mean really slow. Our average trolling speed was .8 mph. Spinners were tied on five foot leaders of fifteen pound test Berkley Vanish Fluorocarbon Leader Material, connected via a ball bearing snap swivel to a main line of ten pound test Berkley Trilene XT. The spinners were weighted with a single quarter ounce split shot pinched on the line just above the snap swivel. Fishing this shallow and this slow we didn’t need much weight to get the spinners into the fish zone. 

Trolling in such shallow water made it important that we spread our presentations out away from the boat to help us contact fish that would be spooked from the boat moving over head. Utilizing Off Shore Tackle OR-12 Side Planer Boards to take the lines out to the sides of the boat allowed us to cover a wide swath of water on these massive flats as well as handle the spooked fish factor. 

Even though we were fishing shallow, this would still be considered an open water trolling scenario, and the fish in these waters can run a pretty respectable average size with fish over five pounds being common. For that reason, we chose to use larger blades on the spinners than you might normally think of using in such shallow water. Bass Pro Shops XPS Walleye Angler Spinner Blades in Indiana style, sizes #4 and #5, as well as Chopper style in size #4 were all very effective. The Chopper blades were the most productive, as these pear-shaped blades tend to excel at slow speeds compared to other blade styles.  

As mentioned earlier, these were not real aggressive fish, and the bites were often tentative at best. The fish would tend to slip up behind the spinner and just “nip” the tail end of the crawler. Even once they had a hold of the bait, they’d simply swim along with it, making reading the bites on the boards tough because they wouldn’t actually pull the boards back the way you’d normally see bigger fish do. We had an advantage however. The Off Shore Tackle OR-12 Side Planer boards we use were equipped with Off Shore’s Tattle Flag kits. This makes the flag on the board act as a light-bite indicator, making it much easier to read these otherwise timid hook-ups. A little added pressure on the bait, and the flag would dip down, signaling the bite. I don’t even want to think about how many fish we missed in years past before starting to use these Tattle Flag kits on our boards.  

On another trip we were fishing the big waters of Lake Erie where the walleyes were relating to large schools of pelagic baitfish out over open water in the main lake basin. Most of the fish we targeted were fifteen to twenty feet down over thirty feet of water. That called for a little different weighting system than the earlier pattern to get the baits in to the right zone. 

For these walleyes, we used two ounce Off Shore Tackle Snap Weights connected to the line fifty feet ahead of the spinner, then varied our dropper length (the line from the weight to the board) to cover a few different depth zones until we could determine what one would produce the most fish. The longer leader is helpful in really clear water like we were dealing with on this trip, cutting down on the chances that the weights would spook the fish from hitting our baits.

All the tackle was virtually the same as when we fished Green Bay, including the use of Off Shore boards rigged with Tattle Flags so we could cover more water and detect light bites.  The results too were similar, with some great fishing under less-than-ideal fishing conditions.

What we took away from these two outings was that even on similar bodies of water, fishing at virtually the same time of year, certain variables need to be recognized so that you can make a few minor adjustments to your presentation to get the same positive results. Consider adapting this pattern to your favorite body of water this spring and post your results on our website’s Forum Page. We’d be anxious to hear how you do.

Editor’s Note:

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