Potholes Walleye Report

[Robbo]

Robbie Tobeck and I cruised across the hill early yesterday morning to try our luck at a bucket list fish for both of us, the walleye. Levi Meseberg at Mar Don Resort said that the lake was starting to cool down and the google-eyes should be on the bite soon. Sounds good to me...lets roll!

Yesterday afternoon we jumped into Mike Meseberg's Ranger walleye boat and bounced around to several spots on Potholes Reservoir trolling small perch pattern cranks in search of a big wally. Even with perfect conditions (wind) the walleye's weren't biting right off the bat.

mesebergs.jpg (74.1 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

We did manage to catch some nice bass though, including this fat smally.

rob_smallmouth.jpg (64.29 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

Levi switched us over to spinners and worms towards the end of the afternoon and it didn't take Mike long to stick this walleye on a Mustad Slow Death hook with a nighcrawler.

mike_walleye.jpg (67.82 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

Levi spun the boat around and took us thru the same spot and son of a gun if I didn't catch this nice walleye. I'm sure most of you have probably caught one of these. This is my first and I was pretty excited about it. Plus...I couldn't wait to eat it

rob_potholes_walleye.jpg (73.76 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

We ended up with three walleye total that evening and just before dark I hit this fat rainbow that slammed my Rapala. The guys were super apologetic about the slow fishing. Heck...Tobeck and I were happy as clams

rob_potholes_trout.jpg (54.08 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

This morning we shoved off on guide Shelby Ross's 23' Alumaweld to fish the morning bite with him and Levi. After a few bass and a trout Tobeck's rod slams down and he's hooked up on what appears to be a really big wally. It wasn't meant to be though, as the hook pulled out after about ten seconds and we were all left to wonder
Shelby cruised over the shelf a few minutes later and sha-bango Robbie's rod goes down again and this time it's a walleye. Bucket list fish in the net

tobeck_walleye.jpg (73.12 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

Tobeck gets his walleye

tobeck_sept.jpg (54.33 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

We ended up with two wally's this morning...both on this Rapala crank

rapala.jpg (76.21 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

Stetson...the boat hound

stetson.jpg (81.22 KiB) Viewed 3445 times

I've seen these Rapala electric fillet knives for years and had no idea how slick they were for filleting spiny rays. Check out this video:
http://video.theoutdoorline.com/view_vi ... ategory=mr

Mike says they are going to close the Mar Don pier to outsiders for the winter and only allow guests staying at the resort to fish off the dock at night. They had a lot of problems with burglary and vandalism on the pier at night...damn people! The bright side to this is that we'll get the whole dock to ourselves on our duck/goose hunt coming up. What a great cast and blast opportunity!
Fishing like this just makes me want to go back for more. My wife and I had an awesome dinner of pan fried walleye tonight and hot dang it was good stuff

[Jeff Nance]

Some fish and chips sound damn good right now, and those wally's make some of the best.

[Nelly]

Some fish and chips sound damn good right now, and those wally's make some of the best.

Hmmm, I wouldn't know... maybe Endsley will "educate" me...

[Salmonhawk]

That was my first trip over to Mardon but it won't be my last. I don't think I have ever seen a body of water with the concentrations of fish like Potholes. If your into bass, walleye, or trout, then Mardon needs to be on your list of places in Washington to fish yearly. Not only was the fishing fun but the Meseberg's are as quality people as you could ever meet.