A friend of mine commented this last weekend, “if the walleye fishing were any better, they would have to be jumping in the boat!” Honestly, it is that good right now and has been all month.
While there are still some walleye being caught straight off the mouth of the Augres River in 30 to 35 feet of water and some really big fish north toward Alabaster, the red hot fishing is south of Point Augres in 31 to 33 feet of water on either side of the shipping channel all the way down to Buoys One and Two at the mouth of the Saginaw River. This is also a wide school of fish, as Friday we could only troll east and west because of three foot seas but still had steady action from the shipping channel as far west as 26 feet of water. In short, right now, there are just a lot of fish in the inner bay. Most of the fish are averaging 17 to 22 inches with a half dozen under size fish released each trip.
The basic tactics remain crawler harnesses behind two-ounce inline weights trolled at 1.5 mph (speed over ground). At this speed, lines run 43 to 57 feet behind Off Shore Inline Trolling Boards is ideal.
Saginaw Bay is a big body of water, the inner bay lone comprising some 240,000 acres. It demands respect. Bottom line: know your boat’s load capacity, and never exceed it. Secondly, stay in port when it’s rough. There’s no fish out there worth your life.
Be safe and have a great day fishing!