Fishing Report – Fox River, De Pere 3-16-2018

This past Friday, March 16th this year was the earliest I have ever put my boat in the water. My friend Deon and I headed up to the Fox River, in De Pere WI targeting pre-spawn walleye.  Being a known hot bite, we were not the only ones on the river. There were easily another 60+ boats doing the targeting the same bite.  Unfortunate the bite was slow…..not just slow…. but slooooooooooow.   We marked fish.  Saw some (but not a ton) of walleye on the electronics and an absolute ton of whitefish.  The whitefish were in there so thick at times that you could feel your bait bounce off of them and several times came back with a few whitefish scales on the hook. 

For the walleye run in both the Fox river and the Wolf river two weather factors are needed:

1. Current
2. Water temps in the low-mid 40’s

We found no current of any significance  This past winter saw much of Wisconsin with below average snow falls.  For most of the winter the ground was snow free. This was great for making good ice on our lakes for ice fishing… but with little snow pack, the spring thaw has sent little water into the waterways around the state.  Combine the little melting snow pack with the lack of rain gives us low water levels in the rivers… which mean little to no current to pull the walleye into the rivers.  My spot lock on my Minn Kota Terrova with iPilot Link hardly had to work to keep the boat in place.  

Water temps are also colder than hoped for. We’ve been in a midst of a long street of stable, cooler weather.  Days are in the upper 30’s-low 40’s, and nights are below freezing.  The warmest water we found was 39⁰ and that was mid afternoon after the sun had been beating on the water all day.

So… no current and cold water temps. This means the bulk of the walleye are likely still staging in the bay of Green Bay waiting for, you guessed it, warmer water and current (most importantly the current) to run up river, fatten up, and then spawn before heading back out into Green Bay. 

We fished for 8 hours and managed 1 20′ male walleye, a snagged whitefish, and 1 lost mystery fish that straightened out my jig head’s hook and eventually broke the barb off.  (Never got to look at it, but whatever it was it was a good sized fish that pulled a ton of drag. ) The lone walleye was caught on a BfishnTackle Authentx Pulse R in Purple/Chartreuse color.  Missed a few bites with that bait as well. The one walleye hit very light (even though it choked it), which means he likely came from directly behind the bait.. 

Cody and Shawn (two other Fishnetic members) who were also fishing the Fox, they had slightly better luck on a classic jig & minnow combination. In retrospect, both of our boats should have been using stinger hooks to catch the light biters.  In seeing the better luck that other boats had, using a stinger hook was often the key difference between and OK day and a slow day. 

The current weather forecast for this coming weekend still is poor.  No rain in the forecast to get the current going… and more of the same stable colder temps.  We need some significant rainfall and a warm spell to kick things into high-gear. 

Lessons Learned This Trip

1. When targeting walleye during the spring, lack of current and colder water makes for a very sloooooow bite.
2. Always use stinger hooks during a slower bite, you never know what you could be missing. (Seriously… how did we not even consider them?!?!? DOH! )
3. Always pays to have some panfish gear in the boat.  We could have easily switched from walleye and caught whitefish.