I took a trip over to Crawling Valley Reservoir this weekend and got to spend the day fishing for walleye. It was a bit of a drive for me but I’d never been to Crawling Valley so I decided it was about time!
I accessed the lake through the campground on the south end of the lake. Coming in through the campground I had to stop and do a mandatory declaration, stating that I will not knowingly spread aquatic invasive species. The declaration form is actually pretty easy to fill out and only takes about five minutes!
Overall, the campground looked extremely well maintained and felt very inviting. It’s definitely apparent that whoever takes care of the campground does a good job! Below I’ve included a link to the website for the campground.
Crawling Valley Campground
Pulling up to the boat launch there was a line up of about five boats. Nothing major but it is a popular lake and gets lots of traffic.
When it came time to launch my boat everything went smoothly. The ramp is pretty much your typical run-of-the-mill concrete ramp (nothing special). All the floating docks are a nice added bonus though, it makes loading and unloading much easier!
The marina is a nice added feature of the lake. To be honest I didn’t care too much about it at first but it was sure nice to have it at the end of the day. It got extremely windy that day and I was relieved to have a marina to pull into!
I only caught walleye and pike but perch, whitefish and burbot are also listed in the Alberta Fishing Regulations.
Crawling Valley Reservoir is listed in the Alberta Fishing Regulations under PP1. Below I’ve included a link to the fishing regulations.
Alberta Fishing Regulations PP1
Since this was my first time out at Crawling Valley Reservoir, I wasn’t sure where to go. for the first half of the day, I did some trolling at various locations around the lake but didn't catch much other than a bunch of weeds. Eventually, I came to the two hidden islands in the middle of the lake and that's when my luck began to change.
Map Source:Google Maps
While passing by the east side of the Islands I started to get hits on the fish finder. The fish were mostly in the 35” depth range so I swapped out my Rapala with a 4” crawfish tube jig and fished off the bottom. I spent the remainder of the day fishing around this area and caught a total of six walleye and one pike. The walleyes were a bit finicky! I could feel them checking out my lure but I couldn't tell if they were taking the hook. I kept setting my hook before the buggers took it and they would get away.
I've included a link to the Crawfish Tube Jibs that I was using, in case you want to check it out.
4in Salted Tubes
Crawling Valley Reservoir is a unique place because it has lots of underwater features and different areas for fish to hide. I didn’t have very much luck fishing the north end of the lake and also found it to be shallow.
I caught most of my walleye in the middle of the lake (by the islands), using a 4in Salted Tube.
The south end of the lake was the deepest area I came across but I didn’t have much luck around there.
The marina was definitely a nice bonus since I was getting caught up in the wind and the campground was exceptional!
I will definitely be going back to Crawling Valley soon and would recommend giving it a shot if you’ve never been there!