Lake Wisconsin

Fishing for both crappie and walleye improved quite a bit this weekend.   The weather on the other hand continues to be quite crappy. We seem to be in a cycle where the weather is nice doing the week and then quickly spirals downward on weekends.   This tends to make me very jealous of those who can go fishing during the nice, sunny weekdays.   Ballweg's Guide Service www.lakewisconsinfishing.com Joel-NancyBallweg@earthlink.net 608-643-7956 608-220-9866...

The boat landings at the head of the lake in the township of Dekorra are now open. Dewey Schultz & I spent Saturday morning chiseling away ice to improve access for bigger boats. We launched my 18" lund for the 2010 maiden voyage around 9:00am and fished till 1:30pm. The fishing was slow but we did manage two saugers and two smallies. Biggest sauger went 21-1/2" long.     Our efforts at the boat launch were for naught though. Someone brought in an end loader and p...

Sunday, December 6th   Fishing this fall has been much tougher than normal but this past Sunday was not one of those days. Instead, it was one of those days where we hit it just right. Joining me this past Sunday was Michael Collins and his brother Pat. Many of you may already know of Michael from his many post on fishing websites where he tends to go by the handle of Greybeard.     Michael & I had been working on doing a fishing trip swap for quite sometime and...

Week of Nov. 2nd thru Nov. 8th I spent everyday except Wednesday on the water last week. Results varied but overall they were pretty good compared to how the fall season has gone so far. For now, I just threw up some pictures as that's all I have time. I will add the story this evening and a more pictures if I don't get them all up now. Art Green 20-1/2", 21-1/2" & 21-1/2"   Adam Lynch 21 sauger & cat Roger Lynch 20 inch sauger   Jason Romanyk 20....

Sunday, November 1st The weather was much nicer on Sunday but you still had to work at it to put fish in the boat. Blade baits worked best for us today. Jigs tipped with minnows or paddletails, not so good but trolling with lead core did put one or two in the boat. Tom Jasinski managed to land all the picture fish today while his brother-in-law Jim MIchalak had to settle for catching white bass and a couple of eaters. Hopefully, November walleye & sauger fishing will be better than O...

Weekday fishing - 10/28 & 10-29 The bite has been slow during the week for the most part but it did pick up slightly this morning. On Wednesday, Mike Hanrahan caught a nice 20.5" sauger with a jig/minnow combo but other than that early fish, it was pretty poor fishing the rest of the morning. Thursday I was out with Larry Regula. We lost a decent fish first thing in the morning, then connected on two that went 21" each. Both fell for a blade bait. A little later in the mo...

Weekend of 10-19-09 I'm pretty much exhausted from fishing for three straight days but I want to get this report posted before I hit the rack and get some much needed rest. So, to make a long story short, the fishing was tough but not impossible. We managed three keepers on Saturday morning while fishing with Tom Bartels & Bill Urban using jigs tipped with minnows. I spent Saturday afternoon with Mike Benthause & Jeff Jones and the bite wasn't any better. We caught more fish ov...

Sunday, 10-11-09 Jerry, Derek & Marc Hopper came up from Indiana this past Sunday to sample the fall walleye & crappie fishing here on Lake Wisconsin. It was their first time on Lake Wisconsin and even though the guys had to work for everything they caught, they were still very happy to be sharing a day on the water with each other. It was a cold 24 degrees when we left the boat landing at sunrise this morning. Thank goodness the sun came out early and didn't hide behind any clouds...

Wednesday afternoon, 9-23-09 Spent Wednesday afternoon from 2:30 to 7:00pm on the lake fishing with Darren Dykstra (Twisted Fisher Guide Service) chasing crappies & bluegills. It's always fun getting out with another quality guide who really knows Lake Wisconsin. Gives both of us a chance to compare notes and techniques. We didn't find a lot of crappies willing to hit our bait this afternoon but Darren definitely found a bunch of nice bluegills that were more than willing to tangle wit...

Sunday afternoon 9/13/09 Don Birkholtz & his son Jeremy went out with me on Sunday afternoon. We left the pier around 2:00pm and it felt like it was about 95 degrees out there. The bite was a bit on the slow side until later in the afternoon. By early evening it was picking up pretty good and the afternoon ended up being even better than the morning. We used the same rigs as in the morning to put 17 nice bluegills, six decent crappies, one 11" sauger, eight smallies & one smal...

Saturday morning, 8-15-09 Clients & I hit the waters of Lake Wisconsin at 7:00am this morning in search of crappies. We found a few active fish right away in the morning but my clients had a bit of trouble feeling the bite. We were casting 1/16oz jig/plastic combo's and it does take a little practice when you do it for the first time. The bite slowed down fast and by mid-morning, it took quite a bit more effort to entice a bit from the suddenly finicky crappies. We finished up at 11:...

Wednesday afternoon, 7-29-09 Don Kronenberg, Bruce Gazda & Dan McCarthy have been coming to Lake Wisconsin for many, many years but today was the first time they hired a guide to help them out with the fishing. To tell you the truth, after the slow bite I experienced with my clients this morning, I was more than a little worried about what we were going end up with this afternoon. Our target species was crappies & white bass and it started out pretty slow but as the afternoon move...

Monday morning, 6-29-09 Chilly, breezy weather greeted us again this morning at the boat landing. The 2nd day in a row where temperatures were far below what we had been experiencing for about ten days prior. The walleye & sauger bite was incredibly slow as well. Actually, calling it slow would be an exaggeration. Completely shut down is much more accurate! Larry Caulkins didn't seem to mind much though. What he really wanted to do more than catch fish was to learn everyt...

Thursday afternoon, 6-18-09This afternoon was a "just for fun" trip with friends Clarey & Debbie. It took about five minutes to figure out that it was going to be a pretty good afternoon of fishing. Debbie pulled in two fish just minutes after we got our lines set and Clarey didn't wait much longer before he started pulling in fish as well. The bite stayed hot for the first 45 minutes then slowed only a little over the next 1-1/2 hours. Crawler rigs behind bottom bouncers was the...

Ballweg's Guide Service Report:Thursday afternoon 6-12-09Spent 5 hours on the lake yesterday afternoon with Rich Schoenberger. The bite wasn't great but it wasn't bad either. We started out slow trolling crawler rigs behind bottom bouncers which did nothing at all. We then switched over to trolling crank baits and that put 3 nice keeper walleyes & saugers between 17-19" in the boat along with seven decent size crappies. We also missed one big fish that hit hard, stayed hooked up for a...

Tue, Jun 9, 2009 -Lake Wisconsin-Ballweg's Guide ServiceSunday, 6-7-09I did make it out on Sunday with two half day trips and although I didn't take any pictures, it didn't seem right to not put in a report. The morning trip was spent with JIm, Kevin & Brian Zurowski. Jim wanted to spend some time learning a little about fishing walleyes & saugers on Lake Wisconsin with his sons Kevin & Brian who I believe are both in their very early 20's. We ended up staying fairly close to the b...

Monday, 6-1-00Mike Werner and I spent the entire day working our butts off trying to catch some walleyes & saugers. Early in the morning, we were actually doing okay but once the clouds cleared out and the wind switched over to the north, the ball game was pretty much over with. The rest of the day was terrible!Mike did catch one good walleye on a crank bait before the bite died down completely. A good looking 23.5" walleye.Saturday & Sunday, 5-30 & 5-31-09The walleye fishing...

Friday, 5-22-09Three generations from the Doyle family went fishing with me on Friday. (5-22-09)The bite was quite a bit tougher for us today but we still caught all our fish on crank baits. We just had to work a lot harder to get bit on this day. Even when we did get bit, many of them fell off before we could get them to the boat.Oddly enough, we never caught a single walleye today. We did manage to catch fourteen saugers, six crappies & a 32" northern pike. (the pike was released af...

Ballweg's Guide Service Weekly Report:Tuesday, 5-5-09Nancy, Kayla & I were out today. We put and even 20 walleyes & saugers in the boat. Our biggest today were a 24" walleye & a 23-1/4" sauger. Kayla is our 3 year old yellow lab.Same bite, crankbaits are still hot!Weekend of 5-9-09Walleye fishing on Lake Wisconsin was both good and not so good this past weekend. Saturday and Sunday morning were a bit on the slow side but by Sunday afternoon, we were back on them again. Th...

Sunday morning, 5-3-09I didn't think the walleye fishing could get any better. Turns out I was wrong!Pat Kelly & his son Dan teamed up with Jack Eggers, (Father-in-law & grandpa) to put the smack down on some superb walleyes & saugers this morning. Once again we didn't go 50 yards before Pat hooked up with a good fish. Before anyone else could even think about reeling up there lines, Jack found himself in a battle with a decent fish as well. The end result of that chaotic moment wa...

Wednesday, 4-29-09 Boog's "Half Tail" WalleyeWhenever I or a client has popped a big walleye in the past, I always try to get out and hit the area again. Many times it will pay off with another good one. That has been driving me nuts this week at work. Yesterday I left a little early, hooked up the boat and headed out to the lake.This is the result of that short, late afternoon trip.My new personal best walleye from Lake Wisconsin put up one heck of a fight and hit the tape at 3...

Sunday, 4-26-09Sunday afternoon I spent four hours fishing with Don & Jeremy Birkholz. They have both fished on the Wisconsin river below the Dells dam but this would be there first time on Lake Wisconsin. We started off the day using draggin jigs & ringworms again. That produced a nice 17" walleye right off the bat for Jeremy. On the next drift, I nailed a 18-1/2 incher on a draggin jig tipped with a minnow. Several more drifts after that fish produced nothing more for us. I work...

Saturday, 4-18-09 & Sunday, 4-19-09Slow, slower and just plain tough. That's how good the bite was this weekend. If you stayed home instead of going fishing this past weekend, then you don't have to feel like you missed anything worthwhile. Every single client that went out with me this weekend received a discounted price or a half price trip in the future because I just could not get anything going. On Saturday, we probably spent to much time chasing back & forth between walleye fishi...