Pennsylvania splits its walleye season in two and puts the spawn in the gap. January 1 to March 14, then closed, then open again from the first Saturday in May to the end of the year.
The dates
Open today by the rules below, worked out for 2026 rather than copied from a chart.
Commonwealth inland waters
Two windows with a spawning closure between them: January 1 to March 14, then from 12:01 a.m. on the first Saturday in May to December 31. The gap is the walleye spawn, and it is the reason the state has no continuous walleye season.
Read on 2026-09-14 from Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission. Legal dates were read on the agency’s own page on the date shown beside each entry. Seasons change: the agency link is always the last word.
Why Pennsylvania is different
Most states with a walleye closure run one continuous season with a spring gap at the front. Pennsylvania instead gives you a full winter season, takes the fish away for roughly seven weeks over the spawn, and hands it back in May. It means the ice fishing is legal and the pre-spawn is not, which is the opposite of the assumption most visiting anglers arrive with.
What to actually do
The reopening is written as a weekday, so it moves: May 2 in 2026, May 3 in 2025, May 1 in 2027. The bass no-harvest window overlaps it — bass is catch-and-release from the second Saturday in April to the second Saturday in June — so early May is a period when you may keep a walleye and must release a bass from the same water on the same cast.
The activity row in the calendar above is our own monthly curve for this species, and it is there to answer the question the dates cannot: whether the fish will be feeding when the season lets you fish. How walleye behave through the year is a separate page, about the fish rather than the paperwork.
Where to fish it
We publish a daily report for 22 Pennsylvania waters, each with live flow or tide.
- Raystown Lake — Huntingdon County
- Presque Isle Bay — Erie County
- Pymatuning Reservoir — Crawford County
- Spring Creek — Centre County
- Little Juniata River — Huntingdon County
- Walnut Creek — Erie County
- Lake Arthur — Butler County
- Yellow Breeches Creek — Cumberland County
An open season is not permission to fish: Pennsylvania requires a licence from age 16, from $27.97 for residents. What it costs and where to buy it →
Questions
When is walleye season open in Pennsylvania?
January 1 to March 14, then from 12:01 a.m. on the first Saturday in May to December 31. The gap protects the spawn.
Can I fish for walleye in Pennsylvania in April?
The season is closed through April and until the first Saturday in May. Bass is fishable but catch-and-release only through that period, so April is a month for other species or for practice.
Checked by Pablo Ruiz Quintero. Dates move: tell us if this one has and the correction goes in the verification log with the date.