Anybody catching a Bunch of 10-14 inch walleyes this year at Willard? Seems to me I have seen a lot of the dinks caught this year? Maybe a trend? Maybe the start of a Serious up swing at Willard? I have notice over the years that Yuba, Starvation and Willard seem to have that happen a year or 2 in advance of the really SPECTACULAR Walleye Years.
I am no pro on the matter but I would say this time of year I always catch a lot more males then females and those smaller fish are mostly males.. Also I have found that worms on bottom bouncers pick up more males the big females that I catch are most often caught with lures like Shad raps and such… Maybe that’s just me.. Also tonight I went out and caught 3 smaller eyes and I was trying for wipers at 4.5 mph I never hooked a wiper all night and lost 5 other eyes at the boat…
This is my first year fishing in Utah so I am not an expert on the history of willard bay by any means. I have found myself catching alot of 22-25" eyes at willard as well as several in the 12-15" range. I would guess they had a 1-3 bad years but it would seem that they had a successful hatch a couple years ago.
Just musing, but I have never seen this abundance of small Walleye at willard in my life time. You cannot go fishing there without picking one or 2 of the little spine’rs up. And if you have been targeting the eyes you might have noticed it as well. Same thing happened at Yuba, and to a much larger extent Starvation , in the past. Not by definitive research or something, but by my recollection a precursor of good things to come. Hoping for the best.
But this could mean the lakes, especially starvation are overrun by a large population of small walleyes. Due to such high competition they may never get a chance to get big.[frown]
That is what happened up at Holter lake in MT. It got to to the point where all you would catch were 12-14" eyes, I have heard it is getting better this year with some in the 16-18" range and an occasional bigger fish. From what I have seen at willard though I dont think we have to worry about stunting. When a lake is so full that they cant grow anymore you will be catching them by the hundreds (pitching jigs from shore.) Hopefully it is a sign of good things to come, especially with the quantity of “breeders” that we have been seeing this year.
Boom and bust here in the desert. Hoping more for the boom. We will see though.