I think it would be helpful to mention your location. In the Eau claire WI. area it depends on the lake or river you are fishing, Most are pre-spawn but some are in spawn depending on the day. Start deep and work shallow.
Minnesota-Twin Cities
Crappies will be in 17 fow pre and post spawn. I would guess your location is similar to mine so you will find them in pre spawn on bigger lakes and rivers shallow smaller lakes will be in spawn.
I fished a small private lake this afternoon, and caught crappies from 8 feet down to under 3 feet. I kept 10 fish from 9.5 to 10.5 inches, all but two were definitely dark males, and the other two were not fat bellied so I assumed they had already spawned. Nope, upon cleaning them, the two were females but were still full of eggs. I didn’t bring the Helix, but I would guess water temp was at or above 65 degrees – it was over 63 last Wednesday. I worked a lot of deeper water before discovering they were still in spawn mode – I was very surprised. This lake is small and bottoms out at around 17 feet. Bluegills and bass were hard to keep off the jigs, but had to sort through them to get the occasional crappie.
Caught a few in a spawning location-think they hang around as long as the food looks good.
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