LITTLE ROCK - For many Arkansas fishermen, mid-February through March means walleye time. The toothy, tasty but somewhat mysterious walleyes live in many Arkansas rivers and lakes.

And where do you find walleye? The walleye is a fish of gravel bottoms, said Mike Armstrong, Arkansas Game and Fish Commission's assistant chief of fisheries. "They like clean water with gravel bottoms in both the rivers and the lakes," he said. "If the water is generally turbid (discolored or muddy), you won't find walleyes on a consistent basis."

Veteran fisheries biologist Carl Perrin of the AGFC has worked for more than three decades with walleyes on Greers Ferry Lake, Arkansas' best-known spot for them. Perrin said the magic number is 47. That's the Fahrenheit temperature of the water that spurs walleyes into spawning activities.

What this means to the average fisherman is that the walleyes begin moving from deep waters, where they spend most of the year into shallow areas for spawning.

Angler Dick Bailey of Fairfield Bay fished for walleyes in the Little Red River before it was dammed to form Greers Ferry Lake in 1963. Bailey said, "Walleyes get active when the water gets near 47 degrees. The males move up the creeks and tributaries before the females do. Males run smaller as a rule."

Bailey suggests keeping an eye on the water temperature by checking it yourself or by calling area marinas. When there is a definite warming trend, that's the time to begin walleye work.

Fishermen work with live or imitation minnows, a favorite food for walleyes. The lure can be a combination. A popular setup is to dress a lead-head jig with a live minnow and work it just below the shoals or riffles of streams where walleyes may be moving in for spawning.

Also popular are stick baits or minnow imitations, either in plain or jointed styles. Deep-divers aren't needed; this fishing is in shallow water. Walleye anglers lean toward shallow-diving minnow lures instead of surface models. Most walleye anglers believe night fishing is more productive than daytime work, too.

Arkansas' lakes with good walleye populations start with Greers Ferry but include Lake Ouachita, Bull Shoals Lake, Lake Norfork, Lake Hamilton and Lake Catherine. All are man-made impoundments on clear, gravel-bottomed mountain rivers -- the Little Red, the White and its North Fork, and the Ouachita.

An outstanding Arkansas river for walleyes is the Spring, better known for its rainbow trout fishing. Walleyes are found both in the trout waters from Mammoth Spring down to Hardy and also in the warmer part of the river down to its mouth.

Current River and Eleven Point River, like the Spring in northeast Arkansas, have good numbers of walleyes. So does the Saline River in central Arkansas near Benton and the Ouachita River from Remmel Dam, which forms Lake Catherine, downstream to Arkadelphia. Lesser numbers of walleyes are found in lakes Greeson and Table Rock, and in the White River near Batesville.

Arkansas holds the world record for walleye, a 22-pound, 11-ounce fish caught on Greers Ferry Lake in 1982 by Al Nelson of Quitman.

AGFC