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Spoon Fed Walleyes
by Paul Rohweller

Just because the ice is rapidly fading away doesn't mean you put all the winter gear to sleep for the season!

A few years ago my spoon collection found its way into my summer tackle box, now it has become part of my ever expanding arsenal of walleye catching tricks.

They can be vertical jigged, cast, drifted, trolled or used anyplace you would like a little more flash. It's good to mix it up.

Controlled Drifting
One of my favorite ways to fish spoons in the summer is controlled drifting of deep sand flats. This presentation falls someplace between vertical tightline jigging and trolling with bottom bouncers and spinners, not too fast not to slow.

Tipping my spoons with half a nightcrawler , a whole leech or minnow will produce fish when regular rigging and jigging won't. It's that little something different that will trip the trigger on pressured or finicky walleyes.

Letting the spoon flutter and wobble its way down to the bottom fish it like you would a regular jig in the same situation. Rip it forward, let it pause and settle back down, lift it an inch or two off the bottom. Snarf! There's another eye that will make the scale at weigh in.

Suspended Walleyes
Another often overlooked situation that jigging spoons shine is on suspended fish, especially those that you don't want to try and run crankbaits through for fear of spooking them.

Many have seen this situation, those hot calm summer evenings where the walleyes are pushing massive schools of dwarf ciscoes to the surface and gorging themselves.

If you have never witnessed this it is an awesome sight. Picking a favorable spot stop the boat, tie on a slow falling spoon like a Scenic Tackle Angel Eye spoon or a do all do jigger, tip it with a shiner or nightcrawler piece and cast it out. Count it down, one mississippi, two mississippi, three mississippi, until you find the best depth.

Repeatability is the key here. Line watchers do very well in this arena, if all of a sudden your line starts peeling out or veering off to the side its time to set the hook! There's another one! Jig and pause the spoon back to the boat and repeat.

Anchor & Cast
Casting spoons from an anchored position has been a proven tournament winning strategy here for years.

Picking an inside turn on a complex weed and rubble breakline anchor right up on the top and start casting and counting down. When the spoon hits the bottom start working it back to the boat, pop it up, let it settle, swim it along and up the break until you find the fishes preference.

Doing the opposite of this can also produce fish at times. walleyes bassin style! Using your electric trolling motor follow the edge of the same breakline and cast into the shallows and pick off active fish, working the spoon from shallow to the deep.

Jigging spoons come in all shapes and sizes and it pays to have a variety of colors and designs. They can be dressed up with prisim tape, bucktail type trebles and some are best fished just plain.

I hope you don't put you spoons away just out of habit, throw them into your summer routine and see how versatile they are and what they can do for you! They also work for other species of fish but don't tell anyone your little secrets!

Have a safe and productive open water season where ever you fish!

Paul Rohweller
Pine to Prairie Guide Service
(218) 962-3387

Red Pine Resort
Ice Fishing on Kabetogama.