If you want to catch big pikes during the summer months, our recommendation would be to look for waters flush with greenery or rock structures. Since a lot of the fish have moved out to their summer hiding places, deep weeds, places that are mostly untouched (like the waters at wilderness north) are always a good place to look especially when the vegetation looks fresh. The other best places to find pikes in summer are in rock drops and breaks. These are more niche places to fish for pike since they do prefer to linger in the greenery, but if the lake you are fishing doesn’t have much or the pike aren’t biting there, fishing in the rock formations might net you some surprising catches.
When fishing for walleyes, we always catch them by fishing in deep weeds in the summer. We also get a lot of fish on humps. We usually start in the mid-depths around 10 or 12 feet of water and then move to deeper, usually around 20 to 25 feet deep. For lures jigs, soft plastics, and live baits all will work well when catching summer walleyes. If you’re fishing in the middle of the day, remember that a walleye’s strike zone will be very small, so you’ll want to fish slowly with a technique that keeps your bait in that small strike zone. Under low light, walleye will be much more active, and you can get them using a more aggressive fishing technique or by using a crankbait/jerkbait that has more fast movements then the other styles of baits.