Lake Sarah

A couple of us decided to go crappie fishing on Sarah last night. The smart one (not me!) set up in a 26ft hole. I opted for a deeper basin and set up in 36ft in my favorite area. While I had fish cruising through all night I could only get 7 to bite of which two were decent size. I used ratsos, little atom nuggies, shrimpos, exude micro shad, Gulp and minnows in all sorts of combinations. The crappies would readily swim up to my jig, bump it and then swim away. The other guy meanwhile got his limit in about a hour and half and headed home. He used ratsos all night but he tipped them with waxies – which I like a dummy had left in the fridge. Lesson learned.

If he were a good friend he would have invited you to use his waxies. If it were not a good friend he would have made some money off of you…..the going rate is 5 times the reg price on the ice!

What a GREAT body of water that just keeps on kicking out crappies after crappies after crappies!

Good pike in there too!

In his defense the other guy was quite a ways away from me and I seldom bring my cell phone. I found out after the fact how he did. Sarah is one of the few lakes I know of in the Metro with big white crappies. One of my all around favorites for panfish as the sunnies are good sized also. If you plan to ice fish just be prepared to be mobile as the fish really start to cruise around in late winter. I plan on using my Reel weeds suspended at about 20ft to see if I can get the crappies to hold under my portable a little longer.

How is Sarah for a spring crappie spot? Still as good as in the winter? Looking for a couple of new places to try this spring. Thanks

Never fished it open water. But it sure gets winter attention from the crappie chasers!

Spring is actually really good for bull gills. Crappies are still good. You have to move around a lot to stay on them. Concentrate on the weedlines around the deep basins and the north weedline in the west part of the lake. I will troll small spinner baits like JR Tadpoles and Beetle Spins but I use Power Bait as a trailer. Small crankbaits have also worked well. Once I find a school by trolling I switch to a slip bobber and jig using 2″ Realistix Power minnows, Culprit paddle tails or Exude Micro Shad. Once the bite slows it is back to trolling. You will find more tha a few days where you just want to keep trolling. I have found the plastics to work better than minnows but I always have some along just in case.

Thanks! now i just have to wait a couple of months.