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Night
Hawk Stories...
Entry 16
How To Win A Walleye Tournament
EDITOR'S
NOTE: Gary Parsons of Glidden, Wisconsin, a professional walleye fisherman,
specializes in tournament fishing, speaking, writing and walleye-fishing
promotions. Gary, who has fished in walleye tournaments since 1983, has
won Angler-of-the-Year titles on all three pro-walleye circuits: the North
American Walleye Anglers in 1995, the Professional Walleye Trail in 1993
and 1994 and the Masters Walleye Circuit in 1988 -- the only angler to
accomplish these feats. Parsons and his business partner, Keith Kavajecz,
won the Masters Walleye Circuit Team of the Year and World Championship
in 1988. Gary and Keith co-host "Bass Pro Shop's Outdoor World," which
airs on TNN.
QUESTION: What tips would you give to someone who plans
to fish in a walleye tournament?
ANSWER:
TIP 1: Pay attention to your electronics. Walleye fishermen, particularly
tournament walleye fishermen, differ from bass tournament fishermen in
that we use our depthfinders as both depthfinders and fish finders. In
water 10 feet and deeper, you'll want to rely totally on your electronics.
If you don't see fish on your fish finder, then don't pay attention or
spend a lot of time fishing that area for walleye. Look around for fish
first. When you're walleye fishing, you almost need to use your fish finder
as underwater eyes to basically look for places that have fish. Then after
you locate them, you can go ahead and fish.
TIP 2: Don't be afraid to experiment with plastics.
Walleye fishermen inherently rely on live bait quite heavily. They generally
use night crawlers, leeches and minnows. In the last couple of years,
Berkley has developed a wonderful lineup of plastics. Berkley makes PowerBaits
specifically for walleye. Quite often when you fish the Great Lakes or
the reservoir systems that have larger, more-aggressive populations of
fish, you'll find that plastics will work as good as live bait for walleye
in these regions. You won't have as much down time if you'll fish plastics,
and the plastics will stay on your hook better. You don't have to constantly
replace the plastics like you do live bait on every single snag and each
bite. Therefore you can actually end up having more fishing time during
the day. Particularly in tournament fishing, every single minute counts.
Also, plastics will save you money. Instead of going through 500 night
crawlers in two days' time, you may only fish with a couple dozen plastic
tails, like Power Jigworms, because you can catch multiple fish on one
tail.
QUESTION:
Do you favor any particular PowerBait lures?
ANSWER: The 3-inch Power Jigworm ranks as my favorite in the whole PowerBait
line for walleye because Keith Kavajecz and I assisted in the design of
that particular tail with its swimming action that looks alive. Too, we
spent almost two years prototyping the new Power Minnow and have had a
tremendous amount of luck with it. Berkley hired us to do that job. I
feel proud of that particular tail because it works, and that's really
what counts.
QUESTION: How would you fish the Power Jigworm or the
Power Minnow? ANSWER: You can fish the Power Jig Worm and the Power Minnow
two ways. The most popular way uses a jig-tipping feature. Basically you
thread the plastic tail onto a jig and fish it exactly like you will live
bait. The second scenario, that I think will become a very important part
of walleye fishing, uses the Power Minnow on a spinner combination. I
like to use a No. 2 spinner blade with a long-shanked hook. I'll thread
the Power Minnow onto the long-shanked hook and troll it behind a bottom
bouncer, an L-shaped piece of wire with a weight, or behind various other
things just like you will a night-crawler harness. However, most anglers
use the bottom bouncer. This setup works extremely well on walleye. Anglers
just recently have started using it in tournaments. I used it a lot in
the Dakota reservoirs alongside a spinner and a real minnow.
Tomorrow: Tips For Using Fluorocarbon Line and Rattles
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