Even if walleye are plentiful, Capt. Bob's advice is useful to Lake Erie fishers

Hanging on to a thin blue sky, three young ospreys passed over the Lake Erie harbor in relaxed formation.

Whether the novices were merely meandering or on a late-afternoon mission couldn’t be discerned from their flight path, which traced the shoreline heading west.

If they were patrolling for fish, they’d come to a pretty sweet eatery with a well-appointed menu. Offering evidence, neither the cormorants perched on the multiple breakwaters nor the human fish chasers casting off walls looked as if they’d missed many meals recently.

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The fishing has been superior this year, particularly up until about the Fourth of July. After that, catching walleye – the species most sought by people , while the birds tend to be considerably less fussy – can get a little hit-and-miss in this central part of the lake.

Walleye follow a loose pattern of dispersion from year to year that is affected by winds, temperatures and algae blooms.

Walleye spawn in early spring, mostly in the reefs of the shallow western lake or in a few rivers that flow into it.

That mandate completed, many walleye migrate east into the deeper waters of the so-named Central Basin, which stretches in Ohio waters from east of Huron to the Pennsylvania line just east of Conneaut. The yearly scattering augments the population of walleyes already there.

During some summers, walleyes can be tougher to find and catch in the deeper basin of the huge open lake after the water warms and oxygen levels fall. The thermocline, which separates water into a distinct warm layer above and a cool layer below, also sets up each summer and influences where fish go.

From year to year the variables, well, vary. What’s been almost unusual is that walleye numbers have exploded, apparently into many tens of millions, based on a cycle of spectacular hatches in recent years.

The upshot has been a year of ramped-up fishing featuring fewer lulls in catching.

While Lake Erie can be occasionally unapproachable to the wise because of weather, a certain wisdom also is required to realize that what walleye want is part of the game.

“Before the Fourth they were biting on spoons,” said Capt. Bob, who’d taken a limit for two in an hour and a half on one June day. “Spoons aren’t working so well now.”

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Instead of spoons, the captain said he’d learned that what the walleye want lately is a nightcrawler trailing on a spinner brought to their water column level by Dipsy Divers and/or downriggers.

That, then, would be the trolled rig of the trip, which if successful enough, might make an osprey or even a cormorant envious.

After a short stint in shallower water not far from the harbor proved less productive than the captain thought acceptable given the price of worms, he ordered rods pulled for a quick cruise to deeper water.

Arriving after some distance at a spot that showed fish on his electronic finder, Bob ordered the process to begin again. Fish soon began flying into the boat and some – white perch, sheepshead and walleyes short of 15 inches – flew out.

Twice two fish got reeled in on the same rig meant for but one.

A limit of 12 legal fish, most eaters from 15 to 18 inches crowned by a couple of bragging walleyes, ended up in the cooler in about two hours.

Hopefully, the ospreys did as well.

outdoors@dispatch.com

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Even if walleye are plentiful, Capt. Bob's advice is useful to Lake Erie fishers