Petenwell Lake – Central Wisconsin Crappie Report

4:30 AM. 21 below zero at the house. Perfect start to a day on the ice. Or so thought In-Depth Outdoors member Pat Howard and myself when we began the necessary preparations to our day of crappie fishing on Petenwell Lake in central WI. Multiple invitations to fish the hot crappie bite that Pat and friends had found were already declined, but that was fine by us. Surely more hooksets-per-angler wasn’t a bad thing?

I don’t mind driving a bit to fish a special bite, especially when good friends are on the other end. Both situations were shared on sprawling Petenwell Lake, Wisonsin’s second-largest inland water-body, and after only one day’s experience, Wisconsin’s most underhyped fishery.

Our first stop at the lake was a local baitshop, where we bought "Rosey Red’s," a pinkish fathead varietal that seemed to be outproducing standard fathead minnows. Here at the shop, a quick glance at the paper Lakemaster Map immediately revealed contours that looked like a huge plate of spaghetti. The fact that Petenwell was a flow-through reservoir with a well-preserved channel remnant was plain from the high resolution map. Also plain to see was the incredible structure available at your fingertips, a big plus for someone like myself who’s never fished it.

We decided to fish one of these underwater channel edges that formed almost a vertical cliff, coming off a flat of 12-15FOW to almost 28FOW. Targeting suspended schools of crappies roaming this breakline, suspended out in the main channel, would be a challenge given not only the frigid temps but the cold front and high clear skies we were facing. "Not to worry," mentioned Pat. "Sunlight doesn’t seem to bother these fish with the water being so stained, and the same is true with fronts considering there is current and the place acts like a big river."

I’m glad to say he was right-on with his prediction, and the day started with a few crappies in the 12-13" range. Then a few white bass, and what followed was a steady stream of crappies that averaged around 12"es the rest of the day. The largest went just a hair over 14"es, and were caught primarily on jigging spoons of all varieties, Custom Jigs and Spins Ratsos in GlowBrite/Pink, size 6, and deadsticked hook/minnow combinations. Pat showed me a number of tricks, including committing to a “zone” that the crappies cruised to target your jigging efforts. While white bass, walleyes, and channel cats were occasionally marked off of bottom, Pat’s patience for fishing in 18-22FOW was rewarded with more crappies than I was able to catch bouncing back and forth between the bottom and middle of the water column.

All good things must come to an end, and a dead battery on the truck looked to be a pretty rough-ending out a few miles on a big body of water like Petenwell. Fellow IDO members and father/son team Marshall and Kurt drove an hour one-way to come and jump our truck (and give us a hard time)! This gave us an extra hour to fish, and an excuse to get a bite to eat and share some stories after all things mechanical were working again. I wouldn’t have had it any other way. Thanks guys for the help, and thanks Pat for some great fishing.