By Steve Weisman

For the past 36 years, the Pocahontas Iowa Great Lakes Fishing Tournament (PIGLIFT) kind of kicked off the fall walleye season! Always held the same weekend as the Iowa vs Iowa State football game, PIGLIFT is a three-partner fishing tournament where one of the partners must have lived at one time in Pocahontas, and let me tell you, these teams know how to catch walleyes. Numbers of teams will range anywhere from 20 to over 30 teams, with most of them fishing for walleyes and the rest fishing for panfish (crappies/bluegills).

The limit has always been five walleyes with a minimum length of 14 inches. For many years, it was a catch and weigh format, and no slot fish could be entered. There was always a concern about the stress on the fish in the livewells, so a few years ago, PIGLIFT officials went to a catch, measure, photo and release. To spread out the opportunity to win the big stringer of fish, if a team won on Saturday, they could not win on Sunday!

This was so much better for the fish, and it also gave the teams the opportunity to measure their best five walleyes, including slot fish. Thus, it became a true catch and measure and total their best fish. At the same time, a panfish (crappies and bluegills) division has also been held, but the panfish continue to be brought to the scales to be weighed.

At the same time, each day’s tournament results, instead of being a weigh-in held on the shores of Big Spirit, have now been moved to Kabele’s Trading Post. Panfish are brought in coolers or pails, weighed and then returned to the teams to be cleaned.

2024 results

Well, 2024 (September 7-8) was definitely a good one with the walleyes taken on Big Spirit Lake.  On Saturday, the team of Marty Cundiff, Ed Vierow and Dewayne Schuler combined for a five-fish limit of 110.5 inches. That’s an average of 22.1 inches per fish!

The big walleye award on Saturday for a 26-incher caught by Andy Johnson with his teammates Scott Johnson and Evan Johnson.

The team of Travis Shimon and Austin Kakacek won the overall length in the walleye category on Sunday with 110 inches. That’s averaging 22 inches per fish. The big walleye measured on Sunday was a 25.5 incher caught by the team of Cundiff, Vierow and Schuler.

As for the panfish division, the team of Dean Weydert, Cole Dickey and Nate Kajewski took the panfish title on Saturday with a 10-crappie limit weight of 8 pounds 10 ounces, while the Sunday winner of B. J. Bunda, Mike Hoover and Cale Hoover boated a 10-panfish limit weight of six pounds.

The walleye bite

Was the bite good? Well, two full days and five fish would not, for instance, be a hot bite over the course of eight hours for each day. However, that’s not how things went. How about this? A  total of 170 walleyes 14 inches and over were measured with 73 landing in the 19–25-inch slot. Over the two days, there were eight teams who had figured out the pattern. Five of the teams caught over 15 measurable walleyes during the two-day tournament. Definitely not too shabby!

What worked

For this information, I reached out to Howard Pattee, a Pocahontas native and the man who started PIGLIFT 36 years ago. Although he no longer organizes and runs the tournament, he still enjoys fishing it. Here is his take on 2024…

For all those 36 years, the key for the PIGLIFT teams has been to troll crankbaits in the basin of Big Spirit. The key has been to troll between 2-3 mph to eliminate water and to trigger reactionary strikes. Certainly, some years were better than others, but still year in and year out, the crankbait presentation was the answer.

That again held true in 2024, but with maybe a little twist. Over the years, lead core was used to get the baits down, but this year the top teams used snap weights to get the crankbait out quickly, to a predetermined depth with the ability to fish closer to the boat. Then it was the matter of finding the depth that the active walleyes were located and letting the fish tell the teams what the color and desired speed was. The top bait used was the Salmo Hornet.

Yup, PIGLIFT is over for 2024, and it appears the fall bite is on…once again!

Andy Johnson with his 26-inch big walleye he caught on Saturday. (photo submitted)

The winning basket of 10 crappies at 8 pounds 10 ounces. (photo submitted)