Sunrise vrs. Sunset for gills.

Bite is on at a small lake south of the cities, was able to get out around noon and fish ’till sunset. People were saying the place will be a ‘zoo’ tomorrow. Would like to go again but would rather go very early in the morning would mostly have the place to myself-hate crowds.
Are gills just as active at sunrise? Nice thing about sunset is you can get things figured out before prime time.Also easier to find someone to go with in the afternoon, if i go in the morning I will want to be set up and fishing at first light or before-tough sell

They’re called “sunfish” for a reason Tim.

Sunrise, you can fish, fish as much as you like, sunset darkness comes to fast than their done. Unless you like to eat crappie, I go home at sunset.

Much rather fillet crappies, I’ll give the SUNfish to the neighbor today.

You never mentioned crappies in your opening post Tim. Crappies I like to fish from an hour before any light until about 10 at the latest…. but more likely by nine I’d be hiking off. On ice I suggest losing the bottom lock and watch the entire water column for fish movement and target those marks that are there and gone in ten seconds…target that water depth…..as long as its not on the bottom.

If I were looking for crappies really early in the morning before light I’d search out places where marinas have a deep flat inside their confines and lots of sodium overhead lights that run at night. Even with heavy snow cover its amazing how much light gets down to where the fish are and how much those light influence what’s going on down there. A number of years ago a couple buddies fish a marina that had the lights and did pretty good on perch during the daylight hours and I agreed to meet them back there the next morning. This was back when “reel-weeds” were making a loud noise and they set up using those things. The fish that they caught got tangled in the weeds so they yanked them and fished without them. The real weeds froze down on the open ice so the next morning when I arrived it was hardly hard to find where these guys had been set up…weed pieces all over and around the holes. lol It was about 1 1/2 hours before any sunlight would let a guy see when I booted out the only hole I fished that they made. The sodium lights were buzzing away and had the ice lit up like a hockey rink so I didn’t need any other lighting. In the next hour I caught 6 crappies that were perhaps the some of largest I have caught thru the ice in my life. Nose to tail, those 6 crappies measured an even 89 inches. My buddies showed up at about 7:20 and by then the bite was long since over. Not happy campers they were. I went home and drove back at 8 that evening and did a repeat of that morning’s performance only it lasted about two hours, but with fish of the same caliber. That bite held together for more than a couple weeks.

Since that episode I have found similar bites in other marinas both on rivers and lakes as long as they had high intensity lighting hitting the water. Something to think about in your travels Tim. And Tim your not wanting people…..I never saw anyone else in these locations except my two buddies, morning or late evening. Only during the daylight hours and the other people for the most part got squat.

Great info as usual, Tom. I’ve said it before…You should write a book! I’d buy it.

I was fishing a real shallow Mississippi backwater the other day at dusk. Maybe 3-4 feet. Bored as for the most part it was slow. Remembered an old piece of Crappie Tom advice to try right under the ice. Figured it was a long shot given it was so shallow. But…BAM! 13” crappie. Sure was fun.

Thanks for being willing to share your tips.

Thanks Luke. Hope your New Year is a fishy one.

Tom the lake I was on was also shallow with medium water clarity. Sunnies will play most of the day but are finicky. At dusk the non exitant crappies turn on and sunnies are more decisive. Do you think the crappies are up higher mid day or buried on the bottom? Have always heard those mysterious microorganisms rise up and that is when crappies rise up (like the Great Pumpkin) and get active. At dark sunnies will rise up pretty quick but often not connect, think I should have something ready with glow, was like they lost the target. Glow might bring crappies in a bit too (think crappies can connect with a lure in very low light w/o glow0 Thoughts?

Crappies have unreal eyesight in the dark. Glow might help but its a relatively new thing….now consider how long crappies have been doing crappie stuff before glow came along. The next time you’re on a crappie bite after dark, try a black jig/bait and get back to me on the results.

Do they see a better silloette with black? How do I get those buggars mid day-are they riding high in that shallow lake?
Thanks

tim hurley wrote:

Do they see a better silloette with black? How do I get those buggars mid day-are they riding high in that shallow lake?
Thanks

Stay away from commotion on the ice and fish slightly higher than the marks you see on the locator. Three days on either side thru a full moon with clear skies can illuminate the water under the ice and cast shadows so keep yourself quiet.

On the black jig….call it reverse contrast. Nothing in nature is as black as the black paint that man puts on a jig. There will always be residual light that we may not be able to detect but the fish can that allows the black jig to stand out against the background water. Black, dark blue and dark purple have been favorite dark water/really low light colors for bass anglers for years. Bass and crappies have very similar eyes and vision capabilities.

Think about this with regard to panfish…. a lake’s water always has most sort of micro-particulate matter suspended in it along with staining. When light levels are very low the black will stand out against the water itself. Now charge up a glow jig under identical circumstances and drop it down there. As the light is emitted from the jig it spreads into the surrounding water and will illuminate all of this particulate stuff and literally create an aura around the jig that makes it appear way larger than what it actually is and the glow makes the bait counter-productive. Now if you control the amount of glow being dropped down there by using a shield when charging [the cover off a matchbook with a hole poked in the center using a small drill bit] that has a single tiny hole in it, thus letting only a very small speck to glow you’ll achieve the same thing as using a black jig only the emitted light is a contrast to the darker water. Many of today’s ice baits use dots of color and glow which effectively break up this huge ball of light the fish get put in front of them when the whole side of a jig is charged. Still, in the super low light that exists after the sun sets even a small amount of glow can put fish off while black [or dark blue or deep purple] can reign supreme. And you may be amazed at how well a black jig can up your sunfish production after dark.

Think I might want to use a sharpe and make one of those zvbes black, that might be a better target for thos gills too that seemed to loose my spoon when it got dark.
Thanks Yoda, I mean Tom

As far as the original question is concerned, I think bluegills are active at both sunrise and sunset. However, I’ve always had more success at sunrise or just after for bluegills (and perch). As stated above, this then gives you the option to keep fishing into the day if you stay on fish.

As far as colors, light, etc I agree with Tom. Glow can be productive. However, black is an overlooked color that stands out in the water more than people realize. I also think plain white (not glow) is a color that gets overlooked with a “glow” craze in recent years.

Glow is great, one of my all-time favorites is a Gapen teardrop, purple-red dot, glow in the dark back. caught a lot of fish on that bait.