Analyze that
Nick Johnson finds walleyes thriving in warmer water with shrimp buffet to again lead RCL Tour on Devils Lake
DEVILS LAKE, N.D. – The ideal trees, warmer water and abundant shrimp united for Ranger pro Nick Johnson of Elmwood, Wis., to propel him into the lead for the second straight day in the Wal-Mart RCL Walleye Tour event on Devils Lake.
Weighing a 21-pound, 14-ounce five-fish limit, Johnson added upon a first day catch of 28 pounds, 6 ounces to total 50 pounds, 4 ounces to retain the lead, surpassing second-place pro Bruce Hill of Forest Lake, Minn., by 10 ounces. Johnson credits his analysis of tree-filled Devils Lake, a place that has swelled with rainfall over the last decade and flooded farmland and forest, to a day of reckoning during the practice period when he abandoned another pattern and started picking apart the trees that held walleyes both in spite and because of persistent cold fronts.
“If you’re not on the right spot, it’s a frustrating situation,” Johnson says. “You’ve got to pick the structure apart and figure out exactly what they’re using. There are so many shrimp in the lake the fish can eat well. I think they’re looking for comfort.
“It all looked the looked the same to me, and it took me two days to figure out what to look for.”
Among the components to look for were freshwater shrimp, a key component of the lake’s food chain. And when the groceries combine with the ideal cover, and when the sun warms pockets of water, the walleyes cooperate. On Thursday, the same theme played out for many of the pros who survived the top-20 cut.
Hole sitting
Sitting on one such ideal spot for the second day in a row was Lund pro Tim Reitan of Sabin, Minn., who encountered something of a slowdown from his second-place standing Wednesday, weighing four fish for 20 pounds, 3 ounces to easily enter the cut in fifth place. It was a similar story for eighth-place Lund pro Mark Courts of Harris, Minn., who dropped a little from third on Wednesday to eighth with 15 pounds, 5 ounces.
Courts says he caught three from a key patch of trees on slip bobbers with leeches and night crawlers – the same spot, in fact, he worked for an eighth-place finish in last year’s RCL tournament – before looking elsewhere.
Elsewhere was where Courts filled his limit as the day progressed. That’s when the water warmed to 52 degrees from the high 40s first thing in the morning following a night when the air temperature dropped into the 30s,
“It picked up a little in the afternoon with the sun on the water,” Court says. “Then I went from tree to tree to tree.”
In search of…
On the search as well was Crestliner pro Jeff Koester of Brookville, Ind., who also told the tale of water temperature and the ideal trees coming together. Koester, too, was bobber fishing with bait.
“Water temperature was the main key,” says Koester, who weighed five fish for 23 pounds, 8 ounces for a two-day total of 42 pounds, 10 ounces, good for ninth place. “I was in 49 this morning and made a move to the other side of the lake and the bobbers started going. I was casting next to the trees and next to blowdowns, and then I figured out the fish were in the brush or in the trees that had fallen over.”
In one of those spots, a hopscotching Koester was prepared to bail when his partner reeled in a bobber and had a big fish chasing. Deciding to stay a while, they threw back in a pulled a crucial 26-incher.
Meanwhile, with a serious comeback after a 68th-place day-one finish (12 pounds, 11 ounces) was inveterate Lund pro Gary Roach of Merrifield, Minn. Roach made it into the cut in 18th with a big day-two limit of 24 pounds, 3 ounces caught on bobber in the trees with two leeches – “the split tail,” he calls it – on a single hook.
Now, the best is almost certainly yet to come in Friday’s semifinals with similar weather of sun and light winds forecast for Friday. The top 20 take off at 7 a.m. Central from Spirit Lake Resort and Casino.