Another gorgeous morning on the SLR..

[Kevin J Legg]

Up early and done early this morning. Another beautiful morning on the river.

[Roughrider IV]

Yep, nice morning for a few, congrats!

Edited July 27, 2022 by Roughrider IV
Fix

[Kevin J Legg]

Beautiful 

[Jason F]

Nice job guys. I can’t wait to get back up there this weekend to give it another shot. 

[Kevin J Legg]

Another early morning!

[Jason F]

Nice work Kevin. Are you finding them in the 30-40’ range? I’ve been out a few times over the past two weekend, but have only picked up some bass. No eyes. Hoping to give it another shot this weekend if the weather is decent.

[Kevin J Legg]

Mostly 30-35 fow but during the day deep jigging in 80-100.

[Grady95]

Got literally driven off The River last night by a swarm of mosquitos.  Just all of a sudden and seemingly out of nowhere, they descended on my boat and just started having me for dinner.  Going back tonight armed with repellant for sure.  Before they got me, the eyes started hitting.  And along with them, this absolute pig of a bass took my plug trolling.  I could not get my hands around this thing.  Cleaned it, there were no eggs, just a few partially digested gobies.  Look at this hog!

[Kevin J Legg]

I’ve been catching some huge bass but release them as I have plenty of walleyes and perch to eat.

mosquitos can be bad in the evening without wind. Less so in early morning.

[Grady95]

Will probably release any more of these zeppelin size bass.  Don't mind the 14" - 17" size, they make decent table fare.  Picked up a few more eyes tonight and thank God, no mosquitos.  Something hit me right when I ran up my favorite little hump.  I think it was maybe a huge walleye but this one could have been a musky.  Where I fish, they have always been there.  Jimmy Evans used to take his guided trips to this place back when we were kids.  Also happens to be a premier general purpose fishery! (as is most of this river)

Anyway, he just stayed behind the boat and fought.  Could not gain much ground on him so I was trying to be real careful about not losing patience and horsing him in.  I usually run about 125-130' out so he was out there a ways.  My lines don't ever break on walleyes.  After about three minutes, this thing took a big head shake and snap, my line got very easy to reel in.  If it was a walleye, I want that plug back!  It was the most productive lure I had.  Something tells me this was no walleye though.  Not this one.  Would have been the first musky of the season.  He's still out there and I'm not leaving just yet...........

[Prof T]

Grady,

 

Nice catch. Yeah, hot, muggy, still mosquito filled nightfall makes you long for October! Good that the fish are cooperating. 

 

That breakoff is what keeps us interested. I had a guy out who'd never caught a river walleye last week who tied into a big something and lost it. He felt bad that he didn't at least get to see it. He wasn't really doing anything wrong, just in a LOT of current. Next day I was out and grabbed that same stickbait. The center treble was gone, fish had straightened the splt ring. Made him feel only slightly better. Walleye limit worth it.

[BlueEye]

Nice catch guys   Gorgeous up there

[Bustersit]

Heading to chip bay area. Gonna do some trolling (like I do on lake O) instead of down fishing all day. I could use some simple tips for walleye trolling on SLR for walleye. In the channel I see lots of guys jigging etc. if I troll along those shelves is it planer boards and stick baits? 
And how deep should I target. Also I do have my downriggers. I know It’s an uneven bottom on the river but do people run them in the channel? Effective?

Dipseys?

any direction would be awesome.  Thanks In advance!!

[Kevin J Legg]

Downriggers will work but difficult if you don’t really know the area. I don’t think planners would be a good idea as drop offs are pretty sharp and also have to deal with floating weeds. Perhaps heavy snap weights might get you to desired depth. Tough to get stick baits deep enough without weight although sometimes they can be caught in 18-25 fow at night.

[Grady95]

11 hours ago, Bustersit said:

Gonna do some trolling (like I do on lake O)

Honestly, if I were you, I would take everything I knew about trolling on lake O, put it in a box under the bed and leave it there!  There are virtually no similarities between that and walleye fishing on The St Lawrence.  I have a big rig too, a well appointed Grady White with all the toys.  It's almost useless up here for walleye.  I don't even use it.

This is about knowing the behavior of the fish and adjusting your techniques to  get their attention.  I'll be trolling tonight for example.  I'll be running in 18-22' but making repeated passes over little humps and shoals that are where these fish come up to from the deep to feed  No way are you going to be able to do this with a downrigger or a planer board.  Maybe you could adapt using a couple colors of leadcore, but I wouldn't even bother.  You would learn SO much from going out even just once with a real St Lawrence River walleye guide.

Full disclosure:  I am NOT a guide!  Not looking to drum up business I promise you. 

I've tried all day to come up with an answer for you .  Other than there is water, tackle and boats, there are no comparisons.  This is just totally different.

If I could suggest anything, it would be to leave the downriggers off.  I can't imaging how long it would take before one snags and snaps your transom off.  As you say, "like I do on lake O."  This river is very different.

[Bustersit]

Thanks boys. Makes total sense. Dragged a few worms tonight and got a couple. It was great. Looking to jig Tomrw try worms at the end of the night again. Appreciate the reply!

[Grady95]

Well done!  Dropped one, picked up one nice one and again, caught a ridiculously huge smallmouth trolling.  To end the night, trolled across a shoal, took no hits so reeled everything in to move.  There on one of the plugs was a rock bass, no more that 4" long, hooked right in the mouth.  The plug was bigger than he was.  Never know out here.

Beautiful night to be on the water.

[Kevin J Legg]

Tested positive for Covid on Thursday so I’ve been laying low isolating. I got up this morning and grabbed a quick limit in spite of some coughing. At least I’m starting to feel better.

[Grady95]

Obviously the fish don't seem to know whether you have the grip or not!

[Jason F]

Glad to see you guys are still catching them. When I got up to my place Friday afternoon I found a broken water line in the basement and 3’ of water. Spent the weekend starting to cleaning that mess up. Hopefully I’ll get back out again soon. 

[Grady95]

Ouch!  Tough luck.  Happened to us.  Our homeowners covered having ServePro come in after we got everything pumped out and bring in these huge dehumidifiers to help dry the place out so it would not wind up smelling.  Actually worked out pretty well.

Best of luck with it.

[Kevin J Legg]

Got off to a bad start early this morning when I drove a treble hook into my finger past the barb while organizing my boat.  I was able to wrap some heavy braid on the hook and depress the barb and it popped right out with first tug. 
  Fishing started slow but ended up with my limit.

[reeleyz]

How did you do that?

 

I drove one in my finger past the barb last month and had to grab the pliers and keep pulling. That was lots of fun.

 

I just love trying to get a fish unhooked with one hand connected to it.

[Kevin J Legg]

Look up easy hook removal and there are several videos showing the technique. I had to modify by tying off heavy braid and yanking my hand with hook downward while depressing the barb. Same basic idea.

[Roughrider IV]

4 hours ago, Kevin J Legg said:

Got off to a bad start early this morning when I drove a treble hook into my finger past the barb while organizing my boat.  I was able to wrap some heavy braid on the hook and depress the barb and it popped right out with first tug. 
  Fishing started slow but ended up with my limit.

I was also out early, slow start till the moon set, then they switched on. Same for you?