— Submitted photo Fishing guide and creative angler Laef Lundbeck with a weedline walleye. Walleye chasers have learned that on some lakes, at some times, they can catch lots of walleyes from the deep weedline.

The recent cold weather in some parts of the Midwest has me thinking about warmer weather fishing, and when I do that, I think about previous fishing experiences. I recently visited a fishing message board and was impressed with how walleye fishing knowledge has evolved. Walleye anglers today, for the most part, are very well-versed. I had the good fortune to be a fishing guide in central and northern Minnesota in the early 80’s. Most of the anglers that we hosted wanted to catch walleyes. Things related to walleye fishing that are today considered common knowledge were just beginning to be discovered back then. Following are some memories from my formative years of walleye fishing.

Back then, it was thought that walleyes were finicky feeders and preferred live bait presented on light line and tiny hooks. And much of the time live bait, light line and tiny hooks are what it took to put walleyes in the boat. They still do. But we also learned that walleyes will take big baits fished on heavy line. In the fall months we spent a good amount of time throwing twelve inch baits for muskies. There were many days when we caught surprising numbers of walleyes on those oversized baits intended for muskies. We learned that in the fall walleyes were willing eaters of big baits. Today we know that in the fall when the walleyes are hungry, much of the time bigger baits will take bigger walleyes.

It was also during the fall months that we learned that walleye feeding times could be predicted with some certainty. There was one particular area that we fished at night for walleyes. We learned that if the weather was consistent, the walleyes would start feeding five to ten minutes later every night on that spot for several days in a row. We were so convinced of this that we would tell guests what time the fish would start biting. We impressed a lot of our guests with this predictability.

Every now and then we got fishing partners who wanted to fish for largemouth bass. We looked forward to those days. The bass fishing at that time in central and northern Minnesota was unexplored and under-appreciated. It was absolutely outstanding. The go-to technique was throwing an eighth ounce jig tipped with a four to six inch plastic worm on the weedline. We caught lots and lots of largemouth, but also lots of walleyes. We couldn’t understand this phenomena: At the time, everyone who fished for walleyes knew that walleyes weren’t in the weeds. At least we thought we knew that. We soon learned that walleyes, in some lakes and at some times of the year, spend a lot of time cruising the weedline. Today, many anglers who are just looking to get bit throw eighth ounce jigs with Ocho worms along a deep weedline. They catch bass, but they also catch more walleyes than we used to think could be caught on plastic in and around submerged vegetation.

I’ve got more fishing memories of walleye catches that were unusual at the time, but are considered common today. It seems like the more we learn about fishing, the more we realize that there’s still a lot to learn about fishing. Today, just like forty years ago, anglers are making discoveries that will change the way we fish forty years from now. Be curious and creative in your fishing and you will be one of those anglers.