I've been pretty determined to get it ever since and many a lunch break has been spent looking like a weirdo on the side of a road, fishing a "ditch".
As the days came and went, I encountered some carp and some browns and even a bluegill, but started to wonder if the walleye was still around. I know that it still had my hook, so I hoped it didn't die.
A few days ago, I picked up a bolt in my tire while on lunch break and had to take it to the tire shop for some warranty work. While waiting for that to get wrapped up, my curiosity led me to explore an area where I thought some water should be. I knew a small creek in the area that went underground about a half mile upstream from there and figured it might see some open water somewhere in the vicinity.
Well, I laughed when I saw it, but I found a small hole in the ground where the creek was exposed. It was probably only 6 feet long at most, but it was a hole, nonetheless.
I laughed even harder when I actually pulled a small rainbow out of it!
It was definitely a stocked rainbow that had swum down from another spot upstream. Catching that was pretty neat, I thought. It's still in there, so maybe I'll give it some time and hopefully the hole doesn't get buried anytime soon.
All that has been fun, but I still hadn't seen my walleye again and my quick stops on lunch and after work had started to become an obsession to land it. Fearing for my mental well being and wasting way too much time on the side of that road, I was relieved to finally get my walleye and put that obsession to bed.
Targeting walleye is something I've never done and all of my previous 'eyes were by chance. Most were between 8-12 inches with a couple going 14 and my former best at a solid 18 from Willard Bay.
Well today I beat that personal best by 8" with this 26 inch lunker that weighed 4lbs.
Darn water spots!
What a head on it! Kinda skinny I thought, but definitely not the standard size that I'm used to seeing.
After weighing it and marking my rod at its length, I revived it in the stream for a couple of minutes until it was kicking its tail every couple of seconds. It's back at home and I even got a chance to extract my old hook from its mouth before saying goodbye.
Persistence really pays off sometimes. I'm just glad I can be done with the obsession. Onto the next one!
Happy Fishing, Humans.
Posts
