By Steve Weisman
(photo submitted) Shane Akin, owner of Great Lakes Guide Service, with a trophy walleye taken pulling crankbaits at night.
Each year the Iowa Great Lakes Area kicks off walleye season with the Iowa Great Lakes Area Walleye Weekend tournament. Ten walleyes are tagged and released into the chain of the Iowa Great Lakes. The grand prize for catching one of these ten tagged walleyes this year is $40,000. Cost to enter the contest is $30.
The contest starts at midnight on Saturday, May 7 and ends at 11:59 a.m. on Sunday, May 8. Blain Andera, CEO of the Iowa Great Lakes Area Chamber of Commerce, is excited for this year’s Walleye Opener. “We are really looking forward to the 2022 Walleye Opener.” Last year was a bounce back year after the 2020 Walleye Weekend tournament was cancelled due to COVID-19. “We had 2,200 people enter last year, and we hope for more this year.”
In addition to the tagged walleyes, contests are held for the heaviest stringer of walleye under 19”, for the heaviest northern pike, heaviest stringer of panfish and heaviest stringer of bullhead. Awards in these categories will be awarded at the Sunday noon luncheon held at the Dickinson County Expo Building, along with an array of door prizes.
Andera encourages people to enter the extended contest giving them a chance to catch one of the remaining tagged walleyes from 12 p.m. Sunday, May 8 to 11:59 p.m. on Wednesday, August 31. Cost for the extended contest is $20. The first three tagged walleye caught during the extended contest are paid out a percentage of the registration fees all summer long. Andera notes, “Two years ago, three anglers caught a tagged walleye later in the summer and none of them had entered the extended contest. Just goes to show, you never know. If you don’t register, you can’t win!”
A major portion of the money earned from the contest goes back to area lakes for lake improvements. Andera adds, “This year it will be a grant application process, where a group or organization can apply for a grant.”
For more information or to register, visit www.okobojichamber.com or call the Iowa Great Lakes Area Chamber of Commerce at (712) 332-2107.
The opener
The opener is, well, the opener…If you are from northwest Iowa, you know that! It’s a happening! People come from all over the country, often times from over 15 different states. People work their schedules around the Walleye Opener! From mid-week prior to the Opener, visitors begin arriving. Motels and resorts begin to fill up and their parking lots are host to lots of fishing rigs.
What can you expect for the opener? Well, first hope for good weather and that the wind will be down. Over the years, the weather has been all over the place from sunny, hot and no wind to cold and windy to thunderstorms to even snow, ice and wind! You never know what Mother Nature will throw your way! Big Spirit, East Okoboji and West Okoboji will have lots and lots of boats, along with anglers fishing from shore. Walleye fishing, of course, can’t begin until midnight!
Walleye regulations on these three lakes have changed for this year. The slot limit size has now been moved to 19” to 25” with one walleye over 25”. According to Iowa DNR Fisheries Research Biologist, Jonathan Meerbeek, “Modeling indicates that this slot length change will allow anglers a bit more time to harvest male walleyes and help prevent stockpiling of male fish in the protected slot. A few females will also be harvested, but because females grow faster, they will be susceptible for a shorter period. In fact, the model predicts female broodstock numbers will actually increase slightly after the regulation changes.”
Night fishing is extremely popular, and the larger walleyes usually come from those in boats trolling most likely crankbaits. With the low light conditions, expect the fish to move into the shallows. On popular lakes like these, it can become pretty crowded with more and more anglers moving to pulling crankbaits.
There will also be a lot of people with lights on at the end of private docks, where they will be casting jigs or crankbaits or using a lighted bobber tipped with a leech, minnow, or if you’re lucking a spottail shiner.
During the daytime, boats will dot the horizon trolling or drifting (depending on the wind conditions) live bait or again pulling crankbaits.
For the contest, the heaviest stringer of walleyes must be under 19 inches in length. This is a change from previous years when it had to be under 17 inches.
Targeting other species
During the late ice fishing bite, some really nice northern pike were taken on East Okoboji. Big Spirit also has an excellent northern pike population. Some will be caught by walleye fishermen, but there are those who target pike in the spring. Last year’s winning northern pike weight was 15.27 pounds.
The panfish contest could be a really contested one this year with the explosion of large bluegills and crappies on Lake Minnewashta, East and West Okoboji. Lots of 9+ inch bluegills and 12+ inch crappies were taken this past winter. Last year’s winning weight was 6.33 pounds for five fish. There is some shore access, but a lot of people will be fishing from boats checking out the backwaters or going into the Harbor or Millers Bay canals on West Okoboji. Some really big bluegills can also be found in Anglers Bay and Hales Slough on Big Spirit.
As for the bullheads, the largest stringers will probably come from the Grade at the north end of Big Spirit. When I say big, I’m talking BIG…in 2021, the heaviest stringer of bullheads (10) weighed in at 14.27 pounds.
If you are looking for updated fishing information, check out the local baitshops in the Lakes area: Fisherman’s Factory Outlet (Spirit Lake), the Hook Up (north end of Milford), Kabele’s Trading Post (north end of Spirit Lake) and Stan’s Bait and Tackle (north end of Milford).
Lots of action comes with the Walleye Opener, but it’s only beginning!
