Courts recommended covering ground and as much of the water column as possible when searching for Upper Red Lake walleyes, which means using trolling boards to spread out the baits and using lures that dive to different depths.

"Because you can only use one rod per person here in Minnesota, it pays to have a couple of buddies in the boat so you can get out a few rods," Courts said. "Run one out each side with a trolling board and long-line one."

Through the summer, according to Courts, the walleyes on Red will spread out over the slowly tapering sand bottom, and you just have to search them out. "But there are a lot of walleyes in Red," he said, "so you will find fish."

Adam Johnson has been burning up plenty of hours on Lake of the Woods and the Rainy River because, "it's about as diverse a fishery as you can get," he said.

"In the spring, the river is a superhighway for walleyes that are prone to use this resource for spawning," Johnson explained. "Throughout the early season, there will be a lot of walleyes concentrated in the river, and you can sit right over them with a jig and catch some very nice fish."

During the summer months, the fishery favors the open-water trollers when it comes to the main basin of the lake.

"I don't even haul my boat up," said Johnson, who prefers to use the local guides who are geared toward this type of fishing. "The guides out of Sportsman's Lodge, where I set up my base of operations, have it all. Big boats rigged with downriggers and all the right trolling rods with lures that have a proven track record on this lake. These guys also know where the fish are because they're on the water every day following those huge schools of suspended walleyes. It saves a lot of time when you hire a guide."

"The Mississippi is a busy place from the middle of March until opener," Courts said, "but after opening day, those fishermen head to the lakes, and the river pressure drops 80 to 90 percent. The funny thing is, that river is still providing some of the best walleye fishing in the state."

To illustrate how an expert's determination pays off in success, we need to look at a trip Bill Slaughter and I took into the BWCAW that was cut short. Slaughter and I took an autumn trip into Basswood Lake where the fall walleye fishing is always tremendous. Well, almost always. We fished all morning and into the afternoon without a bite, and in all the best spots. About 2 p.m., Slaughter said, "Let's go, we can still salvage this trip."

We steamed over the portages and got back to the landing on Fall Lake with enough time to hightail it over to Shagawa Lake and get in an hour-and-a-half of fishing time. We caught walleyes there using the same techniques, on the same type of structure, as we were using on Basswood. You can bet we were on Shagawa the next day.