Pro Tip of the Week: Power slip bobbering for late summer walleyes

By Hays Baldwin

On the mesotrophic lakes up north here that are relatively clear with high lots of coontail and cabbage weeds, I like to deploy what I call the power slip bobber approach, efficiently working through pockets inside large expansive weed beds with slip bobbers.

We’re talking about expansive weed flats in 14 to 18 feet of water, where walleyes will chase young yellow perch and bluegills. These areas tend to offer walleyes the best cover as well, and though there are ussually walleyes out in deeper water, it’s these that tend to be the most active in the system. Those deeper fish tend to be a lot less active.

One key is suspending your bait about 10 to 11 feet down, so it forces them to come up and feed. Also, these fish can be suspeded, too. The efficiency comes in with the amount of time you spend – about 5 or 10 minutes – on each pocket, which tend to be about 10 to 15 yards long. Soak a leech or half of a nightcrawler. These pockets can have four or five walleyes in them, but catching one or two out of a school will cause them to disperse. At least until fall turnover, this pattern holds pretty strong.

Baldwin is a multi-species fishing guide in the Brainerd Lakes area. He can be reached at Brainerd Guide Service at (218) 825-8965.