crappie fishing with the teacher 10/10

[drumking]

I finally had the priviledge to take jwateacher3 crappie fishing with me today. After a foggy start, we got into the fish right away. At the end of the day, we had caught 60 crappie (17 keepers) and about a dozen bluegills. Strange thing was all the keepers came off 1 dock near Island Cove. We caught a bunch of small crappie in wolftever and savannah creeks. Not the first keeper. Jmax must have yanked all the keepers out of there or the bridge fishing are seining the creek as they come in. I had a wonderful time with the teacher.

 

[polo-dog]

Sounds like a great day DK. I need to apologise to the teacher. I told him in the spring that we would get out there and we still haven't. We should still do it some time and I want to have you show me how to catch those crappies. Sometime next week let me know when you are out and we'll catch some.

 

[drumking]

polo-dog - 10/10/2006 7:40 PM

Sounds like a great day DK. I need to apologise to the teacher. I told him in the spring that we would get out there and we still haven't. We should still do it some time and I want to have you show me how to catch those crappies. Sometime next week let me know when you are out and we'll catch some.

We can fish either monday mid-morning or tuesday before the map reading session. I think that I'm going with MB to Knoxville to the twra meeting on wednesday. It will be great to fish together again.emoGeezer

 

[polo-dog]

Monday I could probably slip away for a while. What time can you get me?

 

[Guest]

Great report there DK. Looks like some of them crappies had the white eye. Ya'll must have made it an all day trip.
How did the new sonar do for you? Anxious to know and I know you didn't have time to learn all the functions yet but how did it perform on plane?

Cheez

 

[drumking]

cheez - 10/11/2006 6:08 AM

Great report there DK. Looks like some of them crappies had the white eye. Ya'll must have made it an all day trip.
How did the new sonar do for you? Anxious to know and I know you didn't have time to learn all the functions yet but how did it perform on plane?

Cheez

The sonar performed perfectly on plane. Never did lose the signal at all. I'm so pleased with it. I'm still reading the book and don't have the unit tuned like I want it yet, but there is so much that this thing can do.

We fished from around 9:15 til 1:30. The teacher had to go coach the bowling team, so I dropped him off at the ramp and stayed out until 4:15. I scouted some, played with the unit and fished a little while longer. Practiced throwing my cast net at some threadfins. Caught a few, but I still have a lot to learn about how to throw this thing. All in all, it was a beautiful day. The crappie were yummy last night too.emoBigsmile emoGeezer

 

[polo-dog]

DK, what kind of unit are you using? I finally got the bugs out of mine and it's working wonderfully too. It's so nice to have a unit that works well that gives lots of great info!!!!!!!!!

 

[drumking]

Eagle 500C fish elite. I have the east navionics chip in it. I can actually watch myself tooling around chickamauga lake. I'm gonna save a few trails so that I don't get turned around in the fog like yesterday morning.emoGeezer

 

[Jmax]

DK you may be right, I may have cleaned them out a little. I went again today and had the small crappie problem myself. Ended up with 12 nice ones out of around 35 to 40 so for every keeper I had two short. Jmax

 

[JerDog]

Hey Drumking,

Did you catch those Crappie on jigs or live minners pitched under the dock? Those are some good looking fish to fill the freezer up with!

 

[Guest]

DK don't use no minners!

Cheez

 

[drumking]

JerDog - 10/12/2006 9:49 AM

Hey Drumking,

Did you catch those Crappie on jigs or live minners pitched under the dock? Those are some good looking fish to fill the freezer up with!

I'm sorry for not making this report a little easier to understand. I never use anything but soft plastics for Crappie no matter what time of year. I'm sure that it will happen some day, but I have never been outfished by minnows yet. Could happen tomorrow, but if so, it will be the exception rather than the rule. The teacher did use minnows some and did catch a few, but most of the fish that we caught were on soft plastics.

Tiny bass assassins in the salt/pepper color was the best lure, and I dipped the little keen tail in lime or chartreuse spike-it. That just drives these Crappie nuts.
Really, I experiment nearly everytime that I go crappie fishing. I change baits and colors often. If I have a lure that I'm not really sold on, all I have to do is catch a couple on it when I know that crappie are on to make me fish them more. The little Southern Pro 1 1/2 inch worm that was so hot for me during the summer was not touched this day. They didn't want that profile. When I went back to the assassins, the crappie started hitting them again. Go figure. emoScratch

Another thing, I was using 1/32 oz bleeding hook jigs and counting down the lure to 7 seconds. The fish were suspended under that dock and the water depth there was around 19 feet, so these fish were suspended about 13 feet off the bottom.emoSmile emoGeezer

 

[polo-dog]

DK, did you have an idea as to how deep they were because of something that you saw on your depthfinder or was it by trial and error?

 

[drumking]

polo-dog - 10/13/2006 12:01 AM

DK, did you have an idea as to how deep they were because of something that you saw on your depthfinder or was it by trial and error?

Couldn't get the boat under that dock to check the electronics, Polo, but whenever it has been 2 or 3 weeks since I last fished for crappie, I usually start out using the countdown method of fishing and 7 is the number that I always start with. With each succeeding cast, I change the number until I make contact with the fish, then I count down that number until the fish move again. The pattern usually is something like this. 7-9-5-11-3-13, etc. I change colors too after a few casts.

Trolling is a good method to locate crappie if you know what you are doing and I don't ever troll, so I definitely don't know what I would be doing trolling. Depth control is more important while crappie fishing than just about any other fish seems like. A foot or two can make all the difference in the world and can mean the difference in catching a bunch or just an occasional fish. Except during the spawn, the fish are usually deeper early and move upwards as the day wears on. You see a lot of crappie caught shallow the last couple of hours of daylight a lot of times. I don't know if these are hard and fast rules, but these are just observations that I have made over the past 35-40 years of fishing.

I've just about spilled my guts on this subject, but will answer any questions at the meeting Tuesday if any more are left out there. Hope this helps.emoSmile emoGeezer

 

[polo-dog]

Thanks for the explanation DK. That sounds like a great system. All I can say is that it seems "odd" to me. emoAngel
See you Monday 'bro.

 

[Guest]

Polo I have been using the countdown method for many yaers too. When you don't use minners you gotta make the jig work any way you can.
I'm like Dickie too in that it is an extremely rare occaision that I will be out fished by a minner drownner.
Jigs and other artificials are too much fun.

Cheez