Mike Frisch hosts the popular Fishing the Midwest TV series. Follow Fishing the Midwest on Facebook for more “fishy” information.

Illinois' spring trout season opening Saturday, April 5, and smallmouth bass and coho going on the Chicago lakefront lead ...

Lakefront coho and Illinois' inland trout opening on Saturday lead this sprawling raw-file Midwest Fishing Report.

The midweek warm up should really stimulate the crappie to blitz toward shallow to mid range depths and begin spawning.

Many walleye are starting to show up in the rivers as they migrate ... My last lure I will mention is a bait that I have tied on no matter what time of the year it is and that is a ned rig. The ned ...

Walleye- TWRA did an electro shock harvest ... If its clear, then small swim baits, ned rigs, micro jigs, or hair jigs are the way to go. If there is some stain, try crank baits or larger swim ...

You’ll simply need to remove your swim jig of choice from its packaging and rig your soft plastic trailer on. If you don’t want to deal with the soft plastic sliding down throughout the day of fishing ...

His go-to baits for river walleyes are twister tails, or Gulp! minnows on 1/8 ounce or 1/4 ounce jig heads, depending on the speed of the current. His technique is to slowly bounce the jig along ...

For bass, Aaron Vang reported good numbers of spotted bass with plastics on a Ned-rig, jigs, or jerkbaits. “Crappie are pushing up around Trimmer, and Bobby Garland’s or similar crappie grubs ...

The first fish I caught on it was a frisky walleye. The moderate 7’ 2”-inch ... They’re ideal for soft plastics, especially Ned rigs, drop shots, and wacky rigs. I rarely miss fish with ...

Finesse presentations like Ned rigs and dropshots are particularly effective ... is when fishing crankbaits, jigs, and other lures in 10 to 20 feet of water. There are really more similarities ...