a nighttime PB walleye

[icebadger]

I went out on the cong last night to see if the waldos wanted to play nice. got on the water at 8:00pm and started to fish one of the three places that i wanted to fish. the bait was not active last night in any of the spots i fished so topwater was out of the plan. I went to the stickbait and the flicker shad and fished rock piles and weed lines. the weed growth is getting heavy already some places were weeded up so i fished a bit further from shore than i normally do. the first fish was caught at 10:45pm and it was a short at 17" the next fish was also a short at 14" but the third fish i caught at 11:30pm was the big one it crushed the flicker shad and had the lure down by the gill plates and was bleeding so bad that it died later so sadly i could not keep it alive to put it back to fight another day. the walleye was 26" and 8lb11oz a new pb for me beating the walleye i jigged up thru the ice at Swartswood lake that fish was 8lb1oz, i got it back in 2001. the wind has been a bit of a problem for me this year and the colder temps are throwing things off a bit as well. i don't know how long the fish are going to be active at night hopefully till the middle of June. i have been out 6 times at night and the herring are not as active as they were in the past years. the crappie bite died off fast as well by the second week of may the numbers and size were down by quite a bit. i heard of people getting fish at night in the first week of April that is early compared to years past. some photos of the fish as well included.

[AndyS]

Nice !

[Broad Bill]

Congrats Alex on your PB. I was up last night also and saw more herring as it started to get dark than I've seen all season. A few surface explosions which gave me hope it was going to turn on and it got dark and everything died. Flat calm and no surface activity whatsoever. Interestingly over the last 2 weeks in the spot I'm fishing I've caught more good size crappy at night than I have all season which makes no sense while the walleye and hybrid fishing has been way off. Herring activity has been almost non-existent to date. Crazy over this past week on a lit bobber and jig at night I've caught five walleye and four hybrids which I've never caught one on before but shallow split raps and top water haven't got hit which would tell me the fish are not keyed in on herring so I hope there's not something significantly wrong with the herring population in the lake. I'm typically fishing until 2 am so maybe things are getting going after I leave. Don't know what's going on but at least in the area I'm fishing something has definitely changed. Water temps finally seem to be normalizing but to date have seen relatively cold for this time of year and the winds on certain nights have been brutal so I'm sure all that's factoring into results.

[bunker dunker]

nice fish Badger!!! been the same for the last 6 or 7 days.its gonna happen but we have to be calm and wait{killing me too}.there is tons of bait all around the lake,theres is no shortage.its been a weird spring but the first spring we have had in 5 years that coming off a good winter.congrats again Badger,thats a great fish!!!!

[Esox Luciano]

Nice waldo Badger, congrats on the PB as well! Always cool to have a good fight with a new pb, makes the blood pump a bit more. I bet he tasted like a trophy too, you earned it!. Don't sweat it either, i've ate a few pb's as well. They all tasted good. Getting hungry thinking about all this. Good luck in the big pond this summer!

[NJSquatch]

Congrats Badger. Probably a week of dinners in those fillets.