When fishing finicky gills and crappies, and you know there are fish present, how often is it appropriate to change colors and/or bait styles? How long should you stick around before you pack up and move spots?
Not a big color guy but I will down size and if they don’t bite then I will move. If I have to pick a color it’s always orange. It’s treated me well.
If the fish keep flying up to my lure and not hitting it, I usually keep switching baits until they start crushing it
If your using plastics and they don’t hit a horizontal bait try switching it up to a vertical presentation like a shrimpo style…Had this happen to me a couple weeks back wouldn’t hit my minnow profile plastic, so I threw a shrimpo style on and they were just crushing it… Also a big tip make sure your knot is sitting right so the bait is sitting how it’s supposed to be sitting (horizontal/vertical). I usually keep switching if 2 fish come up and say nope…I have like 5 rods prerigged with all different presentations. I hate tying on the ice haha
If there’s fish on the screen, try switching your jigging cadence before trying new baits, profiles, or colors. Sometimes that’s all it takes.
New Years Day night and Monday after I was on a lake that is known for some quality crappies. What used to be a “secret lake”, has now turned into what looks like a fishing contest. Regardless I still marked plenty of fish, but they were ultra-light bites and in a lot of cases, come up and check out, but no bite. I switched around several jigs. I put on the Custom Jigs and Spins Ratso and it good enough that my buddy switched and we both started hitting them. Color was pink body with glow head tipped with wax worm.
Any given bait may work, or may not work at any time. I used to struggle with this. I would go out and do the same thing the entire trip. I’d either catch fish or I wouldn’t. Now if I see fish down there and they aren’t biting after 5-10 mins…I change something. I’ve been much more successful now. Some days they just won’t eat. Then its 
. Sitting on the ice trying to catch fish beats sitting at work wishing I was fishing anyday.
If the fish keep flying up to my lure and not hitting it, I usually keep switching baits until they start crushing it
Fished last on Tuesday before the cold front came in. We were scouting the ice bite on a lake that I fished last summer for the first time. My partner that day happens to be a first rate guide in our area. He started catching fish on a marmooska type jig with a waxie, meanwhile I was 20′ from him and started with a smaller Hexi fly with a BY Baits Mudbug, they didn’t want and Rob had already caught fish. So I went to a larger Hexi with some newer TriggerX, nothing and Rob was still picking up a few. Went to a vertical jig from the horizontal using Lil Cecil with spikes (red & white), still nothing… Each of the three brought fish to the bait, but they wouldn’t commit. Red spikes showed the best tipper for me. Rob wandered a bit to see if a newer hole further away might help production.
I finally tied on a tungsten marmooska style in gold with a white Shrimp TriggerX (TX)and all of a sudden I had fish attacking… The minor had been an hour earlier, was not so much of a help, but something had changed in the weather that was prompting them for about 30 minutes. In that 30 minutes I lost the gold tungsten, then tried a CJS gold Diamond with a red TX shrimp, they didn’t like as well as the red spike, so went back to the white TX shrimp and did really well.
We fished from 11-ish to 230-ish, Rob kept 5 bluegill, 2 – 10’s, 2 – 9’s and an 8 for his dinner with his wife and I kept nothing, although I did finally get the fish to hammer for a while. I made 12 – 14 changes in that 3.5 hours, I think Rob fish a few different things, one of which was a small kastmaster…
I always try to have both the vertical and a horizontal tied on my 1/2 doz. rods that I carry and the same for the deep water rods with reels. That way I don’t have to retie to start.
As for location, we moved one time, starting on a summer spot with a depth change and weeds, then the second spot we/Rob found the better fish, so even though Rob moved down the lake a bit, we really only moved twice. Now based on some other fishers coming out as we were leaving, I would probably start in that spot to check it out and then move to the second spot that we fished and determine if other moves were necessary following… Later in the ice season, I might even go back to the first spot we tried to see if they might be moving back to the shallows during late ice…
Mark
New Years Day night and Monday after I was on a lake that is known for some quality crappies. Regardless I still marked plenty of fish, but they were ultra-light bites and in a lot of cases, come up and check out, but no bite. I switched around several jigs. I put on the Custom Jigs and Spins Ratso and it good enough that my buddy switched and we both started hitting them. Color was pink body with glow head tipped with wax worm.
This happened to me last Monday as well-except for the part where I switched to a vertical jig and caught fish. 
I could mark the crappie all over in a small 16 acre pond, 8′-10′ down over 13 FOW. I could jig any of several holes and get attention, but not commitment. Spoons, jigs, raps, all the same. Gills near bottom were even worse. Now wish I’d read this post first and thought of a few different things to try. My “go-to” presentations usually work, but dang…another reminder to keep the mind open and be willing to try the stuff you wouldn’t normally.
Also, looks like I should have called @Mbenson. 
reverend, pics too…
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rev…
I probably won’t get back out now until next weekend…
Mark
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