Texas Walleye Association Stop 4 Trinidad, CO
Thursday May 15

Got to Trinidad after driving through a thunderstorm on Raton Pass and enjoying the site of some rain, but not enough.

Hit the lake for a few hours before sunset to try trolling along the dam with jointed shad raps to see if there were any fish there yet. No luck. The bite was still trout and nothing else trolling. 

Friday May 16

Golden and I were fishing out of our own boats on Friday to try and cover more water and see if one of us could get some fish in the boat. I had fished the Northwest side last week hard and only produced one walleye. With some (a lot actually) help from Dave Pettigrew, I was able to get a program together that produced fished almost instantly Friday morning. My first pass through the area yielded a double, 18” and 15”. Both very good fish for this area, I knew 6-7#s was going to be a solid weight from what I had seen of past tourneys. At this point I was pretty excited and moved off the spot. The Genetron was tracking my rigs right on bottom and I was marking the fish that were buried in the mud. My new drift sock paired up with my Minn Kota Autopilot allowed me to slowly creep into the wind along these areas and concentrate on rigging and not driving the boat.

As for my presentation and rigging, I will have to keep that to myself. It is not my area or presentation to give. As most of you who regularly read my stories know, I am fairly open with information, but that is when it is mine. I will say that on Friday, I was able to catch 7 walleye ranging in size between 15 and 19”s.

Friday night at the rules meeting, the mood seemed grim with the exception of Hank McWilliams who had seemed to catch fish fairly easily on Friday. We made our way back to Full Draw Outfitters who were hosting us for the weekend. What a place, right on Trinidad Reservoir. Fred and Tricia Eichler were gracious hosts and also look to be some very good outfitters. Any of you looking for a guided hunting trip in the West, Fred and Tricia are your people. www.fulldrawoutfitters.net .

Saturday May 17

Time to deliver, Golden and I made it to the launch with his new Ranger rig. Realizing that we maybe should have fished out of my boat with the Genetron and same exact equipment I put the program together with on Friday, it was too late. Plus whether we won or lost, that Ranger was a great rig to fish out of. The rear deck was like having the whole boat to yourself. The storage was incredible, I basically moved all of my stuff into his boat with all of his stuff and there was still room. 

After rigging up all of our lines and getting ready for the blast off, we headed over to our spot to setup. We had company and it was not easy to convey exactly how to position the boat to Golden as I had mine the previous day. The other boat worked the area with us for a while politely and they eventually moved on after neither of us had caught any fish. Golden had a Garmin 188C, 188, and 168 all which were newly rigged and had not had time to get them programmed properly. We were not seeing fish on any of them (well, I wasn’t). My Genetron has me quite spoiled for picking fish up that are belly to bottom or in shallow water.

After making our first pass through the area, we turned and headed back. Golden had one; it was a nice fish that had inhaled the bait. In the livewell and back to fishing, the only bad part was that Kevin (Texeye) and Kalin Audrain had just seen us catch the fish. They politely moved on and left us to continue working the point. After another pass, we had another fish, this time Big Jon had seen us (small lake) and also left us to continue on with the point. So far so good, however I was definitely not keeping up my end of the boat with no fish yet. 

Golden caught another fish shortly after and now the wind was picking up. It was almost noon and we had three in the box with solid weights and were on our way to a decent spot, or so I thought. I had a few pickups, but could not get the hook set. Golden was using the Tempress method of catching fish while trying to direct the mighty Ranger in the wind.

We unconsciously made the choice to stay with that spot until almost 1:30 when we decided to move down to the next area that had produced, but smaller fish. The spot we were working now had 2 or 3 other boats working with us (they would only let us have it so long to ourselves I guess LOL). http://www.walleyecentral.com/TWA/trinidad03/pages/DSCN1575.htm We moved down, but not seeing if there were fish in the area or not was weighing on my patience and it showed. Golden should have thrown me in to get a better underwater view. I didn’t even want to be with me in the boat. Again, walleye fishing is humbling enough, but to have caught all those fish the day before and not be able to catch a fish the next day was too much. Some of you may be wondering if the area had gotten pounded with all the fish the day before and it had not. 

There were about 3 spots across an area of the lake that I found holding fish with the Genetron. I would catch 2 and move on, one spot yielded 3 fish because I had a double. Driving the boat, two fish on, getting the net, and trying not to let too many people see what you are doing was a circus on Friday (but the good kind of a circus).

No more fish, Golden was again the only one to put fish in the boat. We went to fire up the big motor with 5 minutes to get to weigh-in and after seeing the boat next to us have boat trouble I was glad we were in a bright new shiny Ranger, or was I. NO BIG MOTOR. The battery gauge was not showing any volts. We were dead in the water. Fired up the kicker, and made it with seconds to spare. We weighed our fish and ended up 6th of only 9 teams.

The other team from Albuquerque had one of those days we all hope for. Scott Sylvester and Gerald Gray http://www.walleyecentral.com/TWA/trinidad03/pages/DSCN1582.htm had also saw us working the point, but stayed on the other side working a similar structure, just on the opposite side of the lake. They were rewarded from the walleye gods for their courtesy. Gerald had dropped a jig down, bounced it a few times and thought he had hooked a big trout. Instead it was a 7.64# walleye, enough to win the tourney by itself. You could hear them from across the lake! They put another 3 pounder in the boat just to be sure. 

Here are the official results and photos:

http://www.walleyecentral.com/03twa_trinidad.shtml 

http://www.walleyecentral.com/TWA/trinidad03/ 

Sunday May 18

Sunday Scott Sylvester and I headed to another lake on the way home. We decided we had heard rumors of giant walleye roaming the depths and we wanted to confirm the myth.

It is no myth. Scott and I had a very relaxing day of fishing on the water with some good catching mixed in.

The picture will tell some of the story. If you want to know where, how, and with what, you’ll have to book a trip with ABQ Sportfishing.

Tight lines,

Brian

ABQ Sportfishing
www.ABQSportfishing.com 
2720 Tramway CR NE
Albuquerque, New Mexico 87122
Telephone: 505-400-3872
Toll Free: 877-658-2487
Email: brian@hanseaticgroup.com