|
Sorry this is coming at you a day late – technical difficulties! But here…we…go…. 😮💨
|
|
|
Reminder: If your email program cuts off the bottom of this email, click “View this email in your browser” up top to see the whole thing. Sorry about that – email programs keep changing stuff.
|
|
|
Lake Francis Case NWT winning details. 🤫
|
|
Another National Walleye Tour qualifier is in the books…and surprise, surprise 🫢 Duane “Dewey” Hjelm walked away with some hefty hardware, ultimate bragging rights, and $95,055 in cash + prizes! Dude is ON FIRE!!! |
|
This derby had a 5-fish limit with a 15” minimum and only 2 can be over 20”…and Dewey got it done with a 2-day total of 27.10 lbs. BIG congrats, man!
The NWT press release said he caught his fish “targeting deeper walleye using forward-facing sonar and dropping a Rapala Jigging Rap down to the fish.” BUT it’s way more fascinating than that, so let’s dive in a bit deeper…
Where:
> Dewey: “There’s miles and miles of shelter belts along the old river channel, hundreds of flooded trees right next to each other. I ran a bunch of those ‘main’ trees during pre-fish, but you could tell everyone was on that pattern. I like to try to do something a little bit different…usually the person who wins is doing things differently.
> “So trying to get away from people, I started targeting spots that were just 1 or 2 trees where fish were just moving by…individual trees and brush piles in the backs of creeks, cups, or main-lake structure that had trees on it. They love those trees. That’s where the baitfish generally go in the summertime…that’s where they’re at. Generally keeping my boat in 20-60’ but fishing anywhere from 15-45’.”
Baits:
> “I was primarily fishing a #7 Rapala Jigging Rap, but I did have a #9 [bigger/heavier] on one rod in case. When fishing 30’ and under I was throwing all #7s – I had 5 or 6 rigged up. Once I got out of that 30-45’ range, I would bump up to a #9 to get the bait down to the fish that much faster.
> “I would throw the “chrome blue” color when the sun would pop out for 10-15 minutes. I like that chrome – that shine – when it’s sunny.
> “When it was cloudy, “regal shad” was probably my best color. If I HAD to pick one color to throw the whole tournament that would have been it.
> “But I was throwing a full rotation of colors…bluegill, pearly white, glow green tiger, and glow slimy lime. I would run thru all of those colors. I’d throw 5 or 6 times at 2 or 3 fish…if they wouldn’t bite it, I would throw in there with a different color to see if they would eat.”
|
|
Tweak:
> “One other thing I do on about 1/2 of my baits is add a #6 VMC Bladed Hybrid Treble…one of those things I’ve got confidence in…it definitely does not hurt to add…it’s something they haven’t seen…. I like the slightly larger [than stock] #6 hook size and the blade adds a little more flash to those pearly baits that don’t have that flash.”
Setup:
He was primarily using a 7′ ML Daiwa Kage Walleye Rod with a 2500-size Daiwa Kage MQ LT spooled with 10-lb Sufix 832 braid (hi-vis) and a double-uni knot to about a 6’ leader of 14-lb Sufix Advance Fluorocarbon. 🎯
|
|
Cadence:
> “My cadence was basically little pops to try to keep the bait in front of the fish as long as possible. Had some fish eat it off bottom, some as the bait was falling by them…but mostly trying to keep the bait around that fish in its face.
> “Honestly I didn’t lose that many Jigging Raps [in the trees] maybe only 2 baits during prefishing…don’t think I even went thru 12 the whole time. Thought I was going to lose a bunch more, but they come thru it better than you’d think…and with [Lowrance] ActiveTarget…being accurate…you can kind of feel your way thru that stuff.”
And:
> “What an exciting but crazy week, my nerves are absolutely shot! I can’t believe I won this one but I had a great feeling after practice that I was going to be in contention. To win this one in my home state is really special but also today is my anniversary and that weighed heavily on my mind all week”.
Well, happy belated anniversary! 🙌 And a HUGE congrats on besting the rest – again!
I cannot wait for the next Tour Level Gold behind-the-scenes episodes to drop….
|
|
|
Dylan Nussbaum lumberjack’d his way into 2nd. 🌳🪓
|
|
Another familiar face, Dylan Nussbaum 💣 walked away with a 2nd-place finish at the Lake Francis Case NWT with 26.09 lbs and cashed-in a $26,550 payday: |
|
I heard that “D-Bomb” was playing lumberjack up in the trees too, so had to reach out to him and get the inside scoop on how he caught ‘em:
> Dylan: “I was up on the bow using the Lowrance ActiveTarget 2 looking for suspended fish from 6’ to 60’. I was actually fishing trees in that deeper water in the backs of bays…the trees would come up 20’ or so off bottom. Walleyes would be anywhere from 15’ to 40’ down scattered all throughout those trees. Some of the fish up higher in the water column were white bass…caught a couple sheepshead and one giant pike…but was mostly all walleyes in the trees.
> “In 25’ and deeper I would cast a “chrome blue” color #9 Rapala Jigging Rap directly to them. I couldn’t be 10’ left or 10’ right…had to be right on them. And “chrome blue” because it’s the best color ever [laughs]. Clear water…it’s super natural…it’s one of my favorites and always my go-to.”
|
|
> “As the bait would drop down…5’ above them I would lock up the bail and start to stop the bait…twitch it until I got their attention. Once I got their attention, I would get really aggressive with it and almost rip the bait away from them.
> “My best cadence was a reel – stop – reel – stop…once the fish would get too far up in the water column [ran out of room to fish] I would let the line open and drop down again. A lot of times they would hit it on the initial drop.
> “Could see a few [sonar marks] in the trees, but as soon as the Jigging Rap would drop a few feet down into the tree, you’d see the whole thing come alive and fish coming up out of it.
> “The fish were super finicky tho…could only catch one fish out of the tree and had to move along…keep going, because the others wouldn’t even look at it anymore.”
> “In 25’ or less I would do the same exact deal except cast a 3/8-oz VMC Neon Moon Eye Jig with a 4” Z-Man Scented Jerk ShadZ.
|
|
> “But the ones that were shallower, it’s almost like they were sleeping…just sitting there suspended. I could cast to them 3 times in a row before they would wake up…then all of a sudden they’d take off after the bait. If you could see the fish dart up and miss it…exactly what you’d want to see. Then I’d rip it again, stop it, and usually that’s when they would crush it.
> “For both techniques I used a KastKing 6′ 8″ medium, fast-action ‘Power Jig’ WideEye Walleye Rod. Running 15-lb Sufix 832 braid with a 12-lb Sufix Advance Fluorocarbon leader.”
|
|
> “Craziest, coolest bite I have ever seen! You can learn SO much with the live technology….”
Dylan also caught some key fish throwing that 3/8-oz VMC Neon Moon Eye Jig with a 4” Z-Man Scented Jerk ShadZ in shallower water in the backs of bays:
> “For my super-shallow setup I was running 8-lb Sufix 832 braid with a 10-lb Sufix Advance Fluorocarbon leader…10’ or less and some even 5’ or less. My last over, I actually lifted up my engine because it was dragging in the mud. Caught that fish as soon as I got back up to the front of the boat.”
Well-deserved, man!
Btw Dylan is the definition of a “fish-head.” Soon as he got back home from this NWT event he went out chasing smallies…then spent 2 days catching WI muskies…and then he was currently skipping docks for largemouth when I called him to get the scoop on his 2nd-place finish LOL. 😮💨 Love the grind!
|
|
|
Austin Ragotzkie “Smiles” all the way to 3rd. 😎🌪️↻👀
|
|
The bearded wonder Austin Ragotzkie (owner of Blue Ribbon Outdoors out of Milwaukee, WI) sacked-up 25.12 lbs to finish in 3rd place with an $18,300 payday. And I promise there’s a smile under there somewhere: |
|
Austin was targeting suspended fish that were holding over 20-50’ – way deeper than he was expecting. Caught ‘em pulling Mack’s Lure Smile Blade Slow Death rigs with crawlers:
> Austin: “Forward-facing sonar and staying really patient were keys for me, and sometimes I am not the most patient person…especially in a big tournament like this. A big player for me though was staying in that deeper part of the lake which really seemed to hold the better quality fish.
> “I’ve never been to this part of the lake before, but I kind of knew the fish here liked rigging, so I feel like we came prepared and our pre-fish was awesome, catching 40-60 fish a day.
> “For us, what worked the best was pulling Mack’s Smile Blades – really tiny Smile Blades [the micro-size 0.8] with just a half of a crawler on a slow death hook with a 1- or 2-oz bottom-bouncer.”
|
|
> “…using a longer Fish Boys Custom Rod was key when trolling for the walleye I caught this week and keeping them hooked up.
> “We tried casting, pitching, trolling cranks, jigging a crawler – and it all worked as we caught fish doing it all – but we found that pulling the Smile Blades was by far the most fish we would handle in a day.”
Nicely done, dude!
Oh, and when in doubt…throw back those Smile Blades and sloooowly “send it!” 👊💯
|
|
|
I literally dream of fishy things like this…. 🥺
|
|
When we’re talking about sniping suspended walleyes out of flooded trees up above…THIS is what we are talking about!
Short preview from this video posted by Josh Moret on Instagram. Can see the tree absolutely come alive with walleyes when he drops that “purpledescent” color Rapala Jigging Rap down thru it. 😳
|
|
Click to watch the full 41-sec clip if you want to see him set the hook and pull a walleye outta that mess, all while holding his cell phone. |
|
|
Lake Erie MWC was won on the “fake” stuff!
|
|
Little reminder that Steve Skupien and Wally Neuman won the last Lake Erie MWC event with a 1-day total of 32 lbs 4 ozs. They also took 1st place in the LEWT tourney “that was held alongside the MWC event in Lorain,” so they were able to fish (and win) both events at the same time and bring home roughly $41K in cash + prizes. 🤑🏆 |
|
Big congrats again, fellas! 🙌 Seriously impressive.
Btw they had a solid limit by 9am and then proceeded to whack another 50+ walleyes [!] in order to add a couple kicker fish to boost their weight.
> Steve Skupien: “…we noticed there was a big bug hatch happening and the Lowrance units showed the walleyes were high in the water column. We were in 26-32’ and ran our nightcrawler harnesses 12-15’ down [for the suspended fish].”
I reached out to Steve Skupien to get a few more details (thx Steve!) on the specific setups they were running…
They were trolling 1-oz inline weights on 7′ MH Fox River Trolling Rods and Okuma Cold Water Low-Profile Line Counters spooled with 12-lb Ande Premium Mono. Size 5 and 6 Bugsy’s Baits SIC Blades with a mix of real nightcrawlers and 7” Berkley Gulp! SR Crawlers…but said they caught their bigger fish on the SR Crawlers. 👀🔥
|
|
Here’s a closer look at the 7” Berkley Gulp! SR Crawlers they used in the “watermelon pearl” and “nightcrawler” colors. These pics are of the bait’s side profile, top, and bottom in that order: |
|
|
If you didn’t know, that new-ish Berkley Gulp! SR Crawler “was purpose built for walleye spinner rigs” (SR hint hint). They can get this kind of action – even when NOT using a Slow Death hook – thx to its thin, fluid tail design:
|
|
NWT pro Korey Sprengel personally helped develop it for several years. I’m not sure there’s anyone who pays more attention to fishy details than Korey, so when he gets excited about a new bait = you can bet I’m excited about it too.
Korey does an awesome job of explaining why they made it the way it is in this video. Thing looks filthy!
|
|
The walleye bite has been hot! 🥵 Literally…. Here’s your chance to scoop up some awesome new gear from our friends at Clam and Blackfish that’ll help you put fish in the boat and stay cool while doing it!
This giveaway includes a Clam Fortis Net, pile of those ultra-fishy Clam Drop Tg tungsten jigs, and $400 in Blackfish Bucks for a shopping spree on blackfishgear.com! (UPF clothing, Waterproof Ankle Boots, jackets/pullovers – you choose!)
Takes just 10 sec to enter and can share the link you get for bonus entries. 👊 Good luck!
|
|
50+ Jigging Rap tips you NEED to know!
The OG of hard-bodied jigging baits! Doesn’t matter if it’s the “dog days” of summer, sunny, or glass calm…Rapala Jigging Raps catch ’em all year round.
I posted this video last year and got a bunch of positive feedback (thank you!) but I keep getting sent in a bunch of questions that are all covered in this one vid…so bringing it back to life!
Whether you’re a beginner or pro, here’s 58 [!!!] tips and tricks to help step up your Jigging Rap game. Stuff I wish someone would have told me YEARS ago.
The whole video is 17:52 long, but it’s rapid fire and comes at you fast. 👊 Hope you dig/dug it:
|
|
|
Those Croc dots are wild, tho! 😳
|
|
|
Thanks SO much for reading! 👊 See you back tomorrow.
|
|
Sign up another fish-head!
If you’re forwarding Target Walleye to a friend who loves to walleye-fish or want your fishing buddies to get these emails, just send us their email addresses and we’ll take care of it! (We won’t sell the addresses, use them for spam, etc.)
|
|
|
Friends of Target Walleye
|
|
Who is Target Walleye
Target Walleye – walleye during open water and all species during hardwater – is brought to you by Al Lindner, Jim Kalkofen, Jay Kumar, Brett McComas and other diehard fish-heads like you!
|
|
|
|
Brett McComas is the main man for Target Walleye He was discovered in Brainerd, MN after years of wondering how in the heck people break into the fishing biz. He’s in it now, but still can’t answer that question…. Brett is one of those guys who majored in marketing, only because there was no such thing as a “fishing degree” at the time…. Get him at brett@targetwalleye.com
|
|
|
|
