Ice Trolling For Walleyes

Hard water walleyes are worthy adversaries. They are hidden from our luxuries of warm weather, our fuel injected outboards, and our roaming crank baits. We as the angler become a victim of nature where we must battle the elements of winter combined with the continuing struggle of out thinking the ellusive 'eye. However, we shouldn't accept defeat as we armed with oil mixture augers instead of fuel-injected outboards and in place of crank baits we have tip-ups. You might be thinking that crank baits and tip-ups are poor analogies but think about it--crank baits allow you to cover water columns and tip-ups can simply be implemented to do the same.

Whether you fish a reservoir, natural lake, or a pond it is important to be versatile in your ways. You need to pan the water looking for active schools of fish or looking for "walleye trails" to common feeding areas. When the water hardens we loose our luxury of virtually effortless mobility. Lets face it, ice fishing can be or is harder than open water pursuit so why not get rewarded for it? Trolling the ice with tip-ups is just the way to do it.

Whether you fish a reservoir, natural lake, or a pond it is important to be versatile in your ways. You need to pan the water looking for active schools of fish or looking for "walleye trails" to common feeding areas. When the water hardens we loose our luxury of virtually effortless mobility. Lets face it, ice fishing can be or is harder than open water pursuit so why not get rewarded for it? Trolling the ice with tip-ups is just the way to do it.

Finding fish with crank baits requires you to roam the open water in search of humps, flats, or edges. Ice fishing requires much the same where you must drill holes to locate the same walleye and/or sauger holding structure(s). Once you find such features you have increased your odds of locating active fish near by. However, that's only half the battle and now you must find the depth or zone where active fish are staging.

Notice I used the word staging. Often, in my experiences on the ice I have found walleyes and saugers to stage off structure until prime feeding times and even then hold off on that structure. Furthermore, I admit that most of my better outings have actually not occurred on staging fish but rather roaming fish working edges on the way to points or structure like sunken islands or flats. Both are important aspects in icing walleyes/saugers and each deserve explanation.

Blanketing the ice with tip-ups is a rather simple method. However, depending on what type of structure you plan to cover can greatly differ your attempts. In natural lakes people often focus on sunken islands, humps, to extending points. Such areas provide unsound opportunities during low light hours. Noise becomes a major factor when fishing such depths. So, to be effective you must locate such structures earlier in the day and pre drill shallow holes.

Now, it's decision time: do we fish the flats or do we fish the deeper structure? Heck, for starters lets go with the flats. Walleyes on flats are basically spread out like they are late in the summer. You will want to look for areas that they will more than likely roam towards during feeding times. Areas such as points, weed edges, or fresh water like springs are good areas to target. These areas are key in gradual structural fishing but you must take into account depths you will encounter. Often these areas hold fish shallow and noise becomes a major factor when fishing such depths. Therefore, to be the most effective you must pre drill shallow holes at least an hour earlier.

Now, it's decision time: do we fish the flats or do we fish the deeper structure? Heck, for starters lets go with the flats. Walleyes on flats are basically spread out like they are late in the summer. You will want to look for areas that they will more than likely roam towards during feeding times. Areas such as points, weed edges, or fresh water like springs are good areas to target. These areas are key in gradual structural fishing but you must take into account depths you will encounter. Often these areas hold fish shallow and noise becomes a major factor when fishing such depths. Therefore, to be the most effective you must pre drill shallow holes at least an hour earlier.

Before starting your drilling look at a map, the visible shoreline, or use your past knowledge to estimate where the most likely feeding or travel area will be. Once you have a conceptual plan put it into action by finding the deeper flats. I usually look for 30 foot of water as a starting hole. If you can't find such a depth take the deepest you can and start there. After you discover your starting depth continue to explore the flat. There are basically countless methods to drill the holes. Supplied in Figure 1 is the approach I use most frequently. With an "H" pattern move 10 to 20 feet between each hole to locate depth changes. Hint: When you go along write the depth in the snow or scrape it in the ice with the end of your ladle...you may have a good memory but I don't!

Once you have your structure located it is time to decide where you'd like to place your lines. Depending on your legal allowance make sure to cover the gradual slopes and also the top of the point. Now, it's just a matter of time so keep your eyes on the flags--walleyes are near!

I enjoy fishing points or flats but perhaps my favorite is steep structural fishing. Often I'll locate a point or mouth of a bay that deep cutting edges navigate towards. Such areas are perfect for setting your "strong hold" (I'll touch more on that in a bit). It usually isn't as time consuming to find edges because the shoreline will be a dead give away of what lies beneath. Like point fishing, drill holes until you find shelves, rocks, or sand dunes that interrupt horizontal flow. Walleyes will follow along these edges and/or sit on the interruptions waiting to ambush baitfish unaware of the lurking danger. For a pictorial representation refer to Figure 2. Note: in areas of steep edges you may only need to drill holes less than 5 feet apart!

I enjoy fishing points or flats but perhaps my favorite is steep structural fishing. Often I'll locate a point or mouth of a bay that deep cutting edges navigate towards. Such areas are perfect for setting your "strong hold" (I'll touch more on that in a bit). It usually isn't as time consuming to find edges because the shoreline will be a dead give away of what lies beneath. Like point fishing, drill holes until you find shelves, rocks, or sand dunes that interrupt horizontal flow. Walleyes will follow along these edges and/or sit on the interruptions waiting to ambush baitfish unaware of the lurking danger. For a pictorial representation refer to Figure 2. Note: in areas of steep edges you may only need to drill holes less than 5 feet apart!

Fishing edges with tip-ups is a prime opportunity to "bottle neck" walleyes where the edge structure serves much like a trail. Ultimately, the trail leads walleyes to areas like mouths of bays, points, or other baitfish stagin

The above isn't a set in stone approach or something you may even want to implement in your plan of attack. However, crankbaits are used in the summer to combat the Dog Days of Summer so why not let tip-ups do the same for you during the Winter Blues?

Editors Note: Tim has spent a considerable amount of time implementing tip-ups into his arsenal for winter walleyes. I recently went on a fishing trip with Tim where he used these very tactics and without them the day would not have been nearly as successful. Look for another upcoming article on rigging tip-ups from Tim in the near future.