Locating walleyes is the first step in any fish-catching equation. If your electronics indicate the fish are present and you're doing little more than running gas through the kicker, it is time to tweak your presentation and time spent on the water. Daytime reconnaissance is a critical component in successful nighttime walleye operations. Show me an angler who launches on unfamiliar water at night and I'll introduce you to the next customer at Joe's Prop Shop. Even if daytime fishing is tough, you can use this time on the water to check landmarks and plug structural changes in as waypoints on your GPS. Those lock-jawed fish that are sulking over an offshore basin during daylight hours are likely to migrate onto that rocky hump that tops out at 6 feet when the sun goes down, doing the hammer/anvil thing with baitfish.

On generally shallow lakes with distinct weed edges, you can use the daylight hours to create a route in your GPS for planer-board distance away from the weed edge, then replicating the route under cover of darkness. Be ready to tap in a "fish" icon every time you hook up.

There is one "fish finder" that is close to infallible -- a hand-held spotlight. Those opaque eyes reflect like diamonds when walleye schools are cruising in shallow water. Locate a school, back off and tie on shallow stick baits, then sneak back a few minutes later and drag that stick bait behind a lighted planer board.

A small light on your planer boards is far superior to slapping on some reflective tape and checking the boards frequently with a spotlight. I've drilled and glued small, lighted bobbers to the tops of four of my Off Shore boards, simply inverting the little lithium batteries when using the boards during daylight hours. A cyalume light stick affixed to the board's flag with a small zip-tie works just as well.

Some states allow up to three lines per angler. At night, this is just asking for trouble. In the final analysis, one line per angler will catch you just as many fish by the end of the trip. Experience teaches that the best way to get two lines tangled is to get them within 10 feet of each other.

Tangling up is inevitable. Having another rod rigged and ready to go -- but secured in the boat's rod locker out of harm's way -- is a sound strategy. All my trolling reels are spooled with high-visibility line. This doesn't seem to bother the fish, even in the clearest of lakes. Hi-vis is easier for anglers to see under any light conditions. But when you're trolling at night and have a black light fastened to the gunnel, the hi-vis line looks like 3/4-inch mooring line.

Depending on the structure you're fishing, it can be more efficient to run most or all of the lines off one side of the boat, with the starboard side generally better because the steering wheel of most console boats is on that side, allowing better boat control as you ease along a dark shoreline.