For those of us who love to fish late into the fall, the extended weather forecast for this part of the world looks pretty good. Stable temperatures should allow for excellent days on the water. Not only that, but we dodged the snow that has hit other parts of western Canada as well as central and northern Manitoba. Recent rainfalls though have increased the flow in many of our rivers. The Winnipeg River has some pretty strong current right now which means Lake Winnipeg greenback walleye have moved in to gorge on the abundant food available in the river at this time of the year. You will need to bring a good anchor and some heavier jigs to cope with the situation though.
I made it out on the weekend and the fishing was good, though we didn’t catch any big walleye. The wind was down Sunday morning so we were able to head out to Traverse Bay. We found the walleye to be in be all along the main river channel in 17 to 21 feet of water. We used the front troll motor to position into the current. Later in the morning when a north wind started to blow, we had to switch around into the wind, which slowed the bite slightly. We did do some trolling on the shallow flats with only one walleye caught. Around noon with a stiff north breeze stirring up some decent white caps, we headed back into the river. We fished only a couple of spots but action was continuous. The walleye seemed to be holding everywhere and all the anglers out there seemed to be catching fish though I didn’t see any big fish landed. Current in the river is strong as mentioned so we ended up using ¾ ounce jigs tipped with shiner minnows.