Ryan Buddie and his family from Amherst, Ohio celebrated winning the Lake Erie Walleye Trail Championship on Saturday, Oct. 12. (Submitted photo)

BY MARK CAHLIK

The crowd at Bay’s Edge Bait & Tackle in Port Clinton for the final day weigh-in of the two-day Lake Erie Walleye Trail Championship figured that big winds and rough waves all weekend on Lake Erie would be tough to overcome on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 12-13.

Little did they know that the tournament favorites, Ryan Buddie of Amherst and Jason Kopf of Avon Lake, would convincingly win the event just around the corner from the weigh-in site, scoring big on Sandusky Bay.

Sandusky Bay? The celebrated channel catfish waters?

Most of the charter boats in the area, including Mark I Charters at Bay’s Edge, remained at their Lake Erie docks for the weekend because of the rough waters, but Buddie and Kopf had no choice. They’d already extensively scouted Lake Erie for big walleye that were willing to bite, and those open waters were not friendly.

The walleye they found offshore on Lake Erie were fairly plentiful, but they wouldn’t bite in the warmer water, which was in the high 60s, said Kopf. The waters around shallow Sandusky Bay, under chilly night temps and fed by the cooler waters of the Sandusky River, were just right.

“The cooler water brought in schools of shad, and the big walleye followed the shad,” Buddie said. “The walleye were in Sandusky Bay chasing shad, and we were casting lures to catch them.”

On Saturday, Buddie and Kopf checked their second day limit of walleye, which gave them a two-day weight of 10 walleye tipping the scales at 61.42 pounds. Their kicker fish weighing 8.09 pounds was also the biggest of the LEWT event.

Sandusky Bay walleyes surprisingly were the key to Ryan Buddie, left, and Jason Kopf in winning the Lake Erie Walleye Trail Championship on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 11-12, weighing in a 61.42-pound winning two-day limit of fish on the scales at Bay’s Edge Bait & Tackle in Port Clinton. (Submitted photo)

That win gave the pair the LEWT Championship, earned them the coveted Team of the Year title, and boosted their weekend winnings to $19,000.

This week, sunny weather and milder winds are in the Lake Erie forecast, and the big schools of walleye are expected to begin feeding out on Lake Erie. Many of the schools of big fish are out in depths of about 36 to 40 feet and are being caught while trolling diving planers and spoons. Some skippers are also trolling crank baits, including the Dead Eye and Dead Eye Baby.

Anglers are reporting the dingy waters stirred up recently are quickly clearing, and the waves have settled down. There are also reports of walleye cruising the shallower shoreline depths from Huron to Vermilion and Lorain.

For night anglers casting from shore, the after dark walleye action is heating up around the Sandusky breakwalls and piers and along the Marblehead and Catawba peninsulas. The Dead Eye Junior has been the hot jerkbait on the casting scene.

Expect the good yellow perch fishing to return around Kelleys Island and the Marblehead Peninsula, off Catawba Island and Mouse Island, and around the Lake Erie Firing Zone.