Up, down, all around? Which side are you and your tactics on?

If you’re a typical angler, you have your favorites, your comfort zone, your go-to tactics. You may enjoy fishing a certain method, even if other techniques may at times be more effective. Some folks simply don’t like open-water trolling, for example, while others don’t want to get their fingernails dirty by touching filthy disgusting livebait. Or you simply may not wish to experiment, sticking with tried-and-true tactics that have in the past put fish in your boat.

Fine. Whatever floats your boat. But if catching fish is more important than catching them in a familiar or preferred way, and if you want to catch the most fish, more often than most, then be prepared to do whatever it takes to catch ‘em. Versatility and willingness to experiment are keys to consistent fishing success. The better you match your tactics to conditions, the more and bigger fish you’ll catch.

And besides, in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter how you catch ‘em. They all count, and having something tugging on the other end of the line beats nothing at all. Bobbers, after all, are meant to go down, too—not just silent floating testaments to crossed fingers, luck, and good intentions.

Where walleye tactics are concerned, tradition leans toward livebait and combos of bait and hardware. Modern approaches incorporate a growing use of artificial lures, not necessarily tipped with whole or partial critters. Barring radically biased thinking, the best approach is to incorporate a blend of the old and the new—an equal willingness to use livebait, artificials, or some combination of both.

General Guidelines

Livebait—Examples: Squirming leeches, wiggly crawlers or feisty minnows fished on livebait rigs or below slipbobbers. Upside: Achieves the maximum triggering for nonaggressive walleyes, although you must fish slowly enough to enable the bait to exert its natural attraction, perhaps even holding it motionless to tease or tempt a bite. Downside: This often limits bait-only usage to high-percentage areas, unless the livebait is fished as part of an artificial-livebait combo.

Artificials—Examples: Crankbaits, jigs with plastic-hair-feather dressing, jigging spoons, bladebaits. Upside: Lures typically are able to cover water more rapidly than plain livebait presentations, enabling you to search larger areas while retaining a good potential to trigger aggressive fish. Downside: During cold fronts, cold water conditions, or periods of fish inactivity, plain lures may not tempt many bites, although excessive speed or motion may trigger strikes.

Artificial-Livebait Combos—Examples: Jigs & minnows, spinners & crawlers, spoons tipped with a piece of crawler or minnow head. Upside: Add livebait to artificials to achieve some of the best elements of each; productive in all but the most extreme conditions. In many cases, the bait can be either lively or freshly killed, adding scent, profile, and taste to quicker-moving presentations. Downside: Nearly none. Perhaps not quite as tempting under tough conditions, or able to be fished as quickly to cover expanses of water, but a good overall blend of positive characteristics to suit most conditions.

Whatever it takes is what it takes, ever after.