Last May (May 15, 2022) on one of northern Wisconsin’s largest inland lakes, my customers and I launched to chilly 45-degree water temperatures. Cold water be damned, we weren’t going to let it prevent us a good day. Despite the lake’s cold water, what we had working in our favor soon after was sunshine with 70-degree air temperatures incoming for the afternoon, and steadily blowing southerly winds. If we played the wind, we’d find the fish. To the windblown side of the lake we went. First areas we worked through had only spawning walleyes. Then to the far north end we puttered. It was the windiest with warmest water over there. For the next 6 hours, we pounded a large sandy, windblown bay that was collecting and circulating warm surface water. It was full of life, and averaging 12 to 14-degrees warmer than where we started from. We stuck with the program of keeping the boat in 5 to 8-feet, casting smelt imitator X-Rap 10’s and 3.8” paddletails up into 3-foot depths. By afternoon’s end, an ungodly number of big walleyes and smallmouths were captured. Each one of them concentrated to microwaves. Location precedes everything in spring, dictati