How To Go Walleye Fishing From The Shore

The Walleye is a tough fish to catch from shore when fishing in lakes. The primary reason for this is the preferred habitat of this species.

Walleye prefer much deeper water than most freshwater game fish. So the first thing you need to look for when choosing a spot is a location that offers a quick, steep drop off into water that is fifteen to twenty feet deep.

You will of course not find many bodies of water that have such a drop off and are within casting distance from shore. You also need to find a location that had a rocky or gravel bottom, the preferred habitat of the Walleye. Again most locations close to shore will have a weed bottom.

If you are fortunate enough to find the proper location you simply need to employ some basic principles for catching Walleye in lakes. Keep you line and tackle light; the Walleye is a very wary fish that can detect an offering that is not natural. I like to use eight pound fluorocarbon line when fishing for Walleye. You will also want a light to medium light action rod to detect strikes. Often a Walleye will not slam into bait like other fish. It will instead pick it up in its mouth and travel a bit before it commits to eating.

During this time it will spit the bait out if it feels something that is not natural. You need to be able to feel these pickups and set your hook before the fish has time to discern whether your offering is natural or fake.

I prefer to use live bait when fishing for Walleye in these situations. It is much too hard from shore to cast a lure into deep water and keep it there for a sufficient period of time. The best live bait would be a large black ribbon leech hooked once just under the sucker cup. If leeches are not available I would switch to a large nitecrawler and hook it once or twice near the thicker end. If you want to really go after a trophy fish you should switch to a small fish in the four to eight inch size range. Whatever bait you use I recommend adding a small split shot sufficient to keep the bait near the bottom.

Fortunately for Walleye anglers there is a much better fishery for this species available in rivers. River Walleye behave much differently than their counterparts that inhabit lakes. For starters you will find them in water of all depths, quite often as shallow as a couple feet. The key indicator for Walleye becomes the current when fishing in a river.

Walleye in rivers tend to stick near the fast current in most situations. To survive in rivers fish need to learn how to use the current and use ambush points in the water to eat. As an angler you need to know how to read the water and how to figure out just how the food chain develops. There are many different places one can fish from shore successfully in rivers.