Fishing around Pierre has been generally good for the good fishermen. The river below Pierre has been putting out limits of over 15 inch fish when the conditions are right but can be harder when either not enough or to much current along with dirty water caused by wind/heavy current are present. Since the 15 inch minimum on September 1st started West Bend has been much tougher. The main presentations on Sharpe still seem to be either nightcrawler spinner rigs or plain hook nightcrawler or minnow rigs however pulling shallow running plugs works except when the wind causes lots of floating weeds. Oahe remains tougher because there are still walleyes in deep water and shallow water making finding them tougher. A bigger avg size walleye still is coming in on Oahe so if you can find them chances are you will have nicer stringers. I guided Steve Crawford and son then worked for the Outpost Lodge on the Channel Feeds repeat customer group (another great group that takes care of it’s customer/work force) and then took out another of my favorite bunch of repeat customers the Sederlin’s Steve and Doug along with Gary Simmons from Kansas. All of these groups went home with full possession limits of walleye along with some smallmouth bass and catfish. It is always an easy guide trip when I do guide trips with repeat customers and repeat business is what has made my guide business stay around for over 30 years. I also better attribute great fishing lakes to work on (Sharpe/Oahe) in that success..Weather will start to be more of a factor as fall approaches but cooler nights should bring the Oahe fish in more fishable depths improving the bite along with killing out some of the weed growth on Sharpe putting more of the fish out of the weeds making easier limit fishing. If you are coming to fish bring some warmer jackets etc. along now as you will be glad many mornings you did. Fly’s are still around so some days long pants are a better choice than Bermuda shorts if you do not want to spend time slapping them.

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