I am not a crappie fisherman …But

What would you do need some advice…besides dynamite. If we would of had some I would have limited out.

Out this past weeekend on pool 8 with my brother fishing mostly gills and crappies. Gills were hitting minnows and crawlers. Found two big I mean big schools of crapppies off a weed edge dropping into 19 feet of water. Crappies were suspended at 11 to 12 feet along this break. Tried plastics swedish pimple with some meat plain minnows different depths, only managed one decent and two small crappies out of both these schools. Baitfish balls were showing up above the crappie schools. Both schools were pretty much staying put, where they were at on the break.

My question is how would you have fished these suspended fish? What was I missing here? Besideds not catching much out of these schools.

Tom,
I have been seeing some of that going on up here too. I have been doing a bit of experimenting with downsizing the presentation with some very common ice-jigs like lil cecils and HOF’s secret color mini-mite.Dont know if it would have worked for you down there but sure has been effective here.I never percieved panfish to be as finicky as walleyes but I am finding out that they indeed can be.

I would totally agree. Make sure you try some mini mites and make sure that you fish above the Crappies. They love to hit it on the fall. Use a bobber and a plastic. Set it a foot or two obove them. Also try casting a small jig. Let it drop. First start with like 5 second increments. Let is sink for five seconds then jig up about a foot and keep that going. If that doesnt work then try ten. Jigs are deadly if you can find what depth they are in. Its a blast to catch them that way. You will get more fish because you are targeting active fish and you will pull out some pigs. They are there go get em

I agree. When the bite gets cold I like the ratfinkee and ratso in a 8 or even 10. May seem way to small, but they work well when the fish go negative.

BIRDDOG

The Mini-mite jig appears to be a 1/16 size but its not lead and is really a 1/32 oz jig so its sinks at a nice slow speed which turns fish on. And that tail has alot of movement which attracts fish too. With crappies, since their eyes are in the upper part of their head you need to fish the jig above them as they are looking upward. When the fish are negative add a waxie which will give it both smell and alittle meat too.
Thanks, Bill

The explosives might be easier.

If going to micro baits doesnt work, try a bigger bait.. and 1/8 oz jighead with a 3″ twister tail can be deadly sometimes too. I have had it happen many times where they would take the larger quick moving offering when they wouldnt touch a small offering. Even add a bettle spin type spinner, or try a road runner jig for more vibration/action.

I have had many fall days when the crappies would terrorize my husky jerks, but if you tossed a crappie jig out there, the results were minimal. Count down rapalas can work well too.

Maybe this will work. Jerry a friend of mine tied up a bunch of jigs with the material called flash-a-boo. We were fishing logs and snags in the backwater up on the cedar last fall and I was using small minnows and got a few but Jerry was using those 1/64th oz. flash a boo jigs that he tied himself and did better then I did, a whole lot better. We fished several snags and caught crappies on all of them and Jerry always caught the most because of this little jig. I seen a couple nice crappies follow the jig to the surface then hit it, if they missed Jerry dropped it back down and the crappies took it, they wouldn’t do that with just a small minnow. This material is like a thin mylar tinsel and it produces a rainbow of colors and flash, all I know is they work. I seen a couple catching crappies one time in the back waters of the mississippi and they had tiny bobbers on and under it was a tiny ice fly jig about 1/50th and smaller in size and they both were catching crappies that were over a log jam. These tiny flash a boo jigs do work good and if you can’t find any of those try ice flies like the guys say here.

In Kansas they allow cast nets for bait.We had some awesome days on crappie like that.Caught a net full of shad and dropped them in above the scool of crappie on 1/32 oz jigs and they would go nuts.

Thanks guy`s for all the tips. I don`t ice fish much so I may have to have Dean set me up with some ice stuff and give that a go.

Darn I…suppose….. I would have to make a trip to Redwing to pick these up and I suppose I would have to draaaaaag the boat along too. Life kinda sucks doesn`t it.

Dont forget the baked goods!

Yo Tom,

On Pool 8 the Pink/white Mini Mite pitched into the school and letting it drop has been producing the nicer crappies for me. Make sure you get more than one because you will go through the white plastic tails. White wedgee’s make for a good replacement tail when cut down just a tad.

Pitch out and keep an eye on your line while the jig drops. As soon as it stops, twitches or moves side ways set the hook. The larger fish have also been schooling closer to structure along some current.

Bret

If your elctronics shows you a well defined school of bait over the crappies, try getting the bait just to the bottom edge of that school. Crappies will rise up to pick off a minnow that gets outside of the ball.

Another thoughther too is to try to target some of the peripheral crappies. Don’t always concentrate on those which hang closest to the bait source. Often you’ll find that the concentrated numbers of prey fish are the smaller ones with the larger fish sitting off to the side and and feeding when the opportunity shows itself.

Down-sizing is one option. Try up-sizing as well. 3″ twisters are not out of the question nor are 1/4 ounce heads. Fall weather will often find the crappies sporting a serious feedbag issue and larger baits are taken as well as the smaller ones if the fish are active. The stuff smaller than the mini-mites might do the trick if the fish are showing up in a funk and are playing hard to get.

Quote:

---

Another thought here too is to try to target some of the peripheral crappies. Don’t always concentrate on those which hang closest to the bait source. Often you’ll find that the concentrated numbers of prey fish are the smaller ones with the larger fish sitting off to the side and and feeding when the opportunity shows itself.

---

Thanks never thought of it in that light allways figured the closer fish, to the bait school the more active.

Thanks

Speaking of going big…..we had unbelievable success on the ringworms today!!! 12-15 inch crappies as fast as you could release them for a half hour and then it died instantly. Will get some pictures soon to post.

One more thing that works for me on occasion is to casr well past where the activity is and allow your bait to fall to the bottom. Slowly work your bait back up and thru the range of active fish. If larger fish are found at the lower levels and are active, they’ll find the bait even though they tend to watch for food by looking upward. This approach is best when slow retreive rates are used.

Quote:

---

Slowly work your bait back up and thru the range of active fish

---

I fished Lake Zumbro near home this morning and had the first fish [crappie even] of the day hit high….like on the surface. Funny thing is, it hit the float. The stem at the bottom of the float went thru the upper mouth and wedged the float in its mugg and then the line got wrapped around the stem on the outside of the mouth. II have never landed a fish on a float before. I’ve had a million fish HIT the float and some even swim off with it, but this was bizarre the way it got hooked up.

Most of my crappies were high up today, less than four feet deep regardless of water depth. All I used today was a jig/plastic combo. 20 someodd crappies and double that in nice sunnies, but the crappie size was shoddy. That doesn’t happen much on the Zumbro…..the fish are usually quite nice.