No two lakes are ever the same so there is no rubber stamp that covers all situations when it comes to fish location. That is the beauty of fishing, you can put together a pattern that works really well on a given fishery and then travel twenty miles and find a completely different set of rules. Even on a given lake, different parts of a lake will have unique characteristics that set each area apart. Places with multiple personalities. Leech Lake in northern Minnesota fits that mold along with Devils Lake in north central North Dakota.
Come mid-summer, the reality is that most major walleye fisheries will reveal several patterns happening in unison. There usually is no silver bullet where every walleye in the lake is following the same program. There are usually fish using deep structure, fish over basins, fish that are suspended and shallow patterns that might require weeds or wind. All of these different patterns happening at once often reflect the diversity of many forage bases. Fish that are keying on tullibee or smelt for example will be on a completely different program than fish that are focused on young of the year perch. Throw in several desirable forage fish along with invertebrate activity and the options on where to look is endless.
Many anglers try to analyze the lake or forage and then work their way from the top. The old adage of angling… find a walleye’s meal and you will find walleye. The trouble with this mentality is that we often don’t know what the best option is until we spend some time on the water. I often like to approach fishing with a different mindset. Find walleye, sample as much water as possible and then figure out why the fish are where they are. Read more from Jason and see a related video at this link….