Wow this has been a tough spring for those of us who chase the Walleye. Everyday it seems like the wind is blowing 15-30 no matter which way it comes from. One of the things I've learned over the years is to try not to fight mother nature, to take what you get and work with it as best you can. Now I know there is a pretty good bite right now on some of the big lakes and if you have to fish them we'll talk here in a little bit about how to try to put some fish in the well, but if you don't have to fish the big lakes why not try a river or small lake that you drive by a hundred times to get to the big ones.

I"ve had some awesome days of fishing when the day before I planned on fishing one of the big lakes here in Minn, then to wake up and find out the forecast had changed to Windy with a good chance of rain. But remember an awesome day of fishing for me doesn't always mean I have to fill the live well, sometimes being with the wife and kids or with some buddies, picking a little lake that we have never fished before and putting together a pattern on this little lake to put just a couple of fish in the well is very gratifying. I always use the help of a little bait store that usually is nearby, they won't have all the answers of coarse but they will almost always give you at least a head start on your search.

Now lets talk about some tactics if you have to be out in the elements. The first thing is to have some equipment to make your life a little easier. Anchors, I always carry two, a big water spike and a navy style, and who ever tries to tell you that there is no skill in anchoring up is a fool. Make sure you have 100-150 ft of rope so you can keep letting out more to truly work an area without re-anchoring, some of my best days on Mil-lacs have been setting up on the windy side of a rock pile and letting some corks and jigs do all the work. Also a couple of big drift socks if your going to try to drag some baits along the bottom, the bigger the better to slow you down as much as possible.

There is a new product out this year called a Tech-Stick made by Fin-Tech, it's a new live bait sinker that lets you change sinker sizes without retying lines and when it's blowing hard we all know how miserable it is to re-tie lines. One thing to remember when the wind blows hard for a day or two in the same direction and then finally calms down there will always be an under current coming back in the opposite direction for a day or two and that little bit of current will change some patterns of the fish, try to work some structure that will let the fish hide from the current and lay there and wait for an easy meal.