Walker Lake - Kirkwood

[gramps50]

Went to Walker Lake in Kirkwood this evening. Appears the bottom is real rocky as I kept getting hung up and loosing my Ned's jig's after 2 I switched to a small shallow diving crank bait. Fished it till dark with no luck. Tried a couple of Sencos one green pumpkin and white and one black, nothing. Went back to the Ned's jig and was fishing off the dock and got a nice bite but failed on the hook up, looked like it might have been a decent catch.

There was a note there that someone had dumped some gold fish and Koa in the lake some are to big to be bait for the other fish so they were asking that any caught not be throw back in but removed and taken away or at the least thrown in the trash.

Seems that Kirkwood redid the lake last year so it might still be a little young for fishing, talked to one guy who had caught 4 bass but he didn't say how big they were.

Looks like a nice lake and from the looks of it there should be fish, will probably try it again this fall.

[Smalliebigs]

Gramps.....I know this dude that lives in Kirkwood and has this weird psychosis were he feels the need to stock fish for some reason or another??? anyway, I met him after a bottle or two of Robert Sinskey Pinot Noir one night up there....I only live a block or two from that park.....he had a 50 gallon plastic drum cut off about three quarters of the way up and it had 9 bass in it from some pond he knew of where a developer was building a new area and was going to destroy a pond he fished as kid. He said it had always had a great population bass and big ones...he also felt is was his duty to get those fish out of that pond and into a new pond like Walker lake where they are supposed to make catch-nrelease only from what I heard???

Just to let you know he put all of the bass in the park lake and two looked to be well over three pounds, the others were anywhere from 12 to 14 inches. I was taken back by this crazy Pinot drinking fool but, he said he has stocked the Kirkwood park lake and the Des Peres lake with largemouth. The fish he released all looked real healthy to me and swam away. The dude had a nice bubbler with a 6 volt battery in his truck bed hooked up to the barrel. He said he had this psychosis, he wanted better fishing for all??? I asked was he catching all of these fish to get them here??? and he just smiled and said that's the best part???? The guy knew his Pinot Noir and how to go catch bass quick, he said he did three runs in a night possibly fifty total fish between the two lakes.

I have caught three bass out of Walker lake in the three to four pound range....and it was at night on a frog bait by all of the new plants they have planted all along the banks......for what's it worth....to me it seems, a ton of road oil and bad stuff drains into there when it rains....so hopefully all of the plants will help

[moguy1973]

I'm not sure what they did to that lake but it seems really shallow to me? I had a shallow diving squarebill on earlier this spring up there and I couldn't keep it off the bottom, even out in the middle of the lake. I never have caught a fish out of Walker. I've always had better luck up at Des Peres. Supposedly the same people that redid Des Peres did Walker too, and maybe it is that Walker is too "new" for any fish to have fully restored the habitat. They need to make it C&R for a couple years, and actually they need to remove the C&R from Des Peres. That lake is severely over populated with small bass...

[gramps50]

Been back to Walker several times in the last week. The 1st was last Sunday, caught a couple early evening not trophies but 13-14" range. Then after dark and late I hit a spot & would catch one on every throw or at least get a bite. Got 4 more in the 12-14" range with the biggest being 14.5". Been back a couple of times since but only manage to catch one each time. Where I was catching fish Sunday isn't giving anything not even a bite, even when fishing at the same time. Everything has been up pretty close to the shore.

The only other fish I have seen caught is real small sunfish. The signs are still there for the koi, if caught to remove them and not return them to the lake. I would think that MCD could shock the lake and get them out.

Looks like they have some catch ponds to filter the water coming off the parking lot that filters the water before it enters the lake. I haven't been there after a big rain to see how well it works.

They still have the limit signs up & there is nothing about C&R mentioned.

I've been to DePeres several times with no luck, could be the time, normally mid afternoon, but never had any luck there. But that was last year.