Favorite Crappie Baits & Colors

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Daniel Tn

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Just a curious poll to see what you guys like to throw for those slabs. I know from the fishing reports that you guys are big fans of the Panfish Assassins. I've bought a few packs of them in various colors but don't have a clue as to how to rig them or what colors really work best. I tried rigging them on the Road Runner heads and on various roundball jig heads but they don't seem to come through the water good for some reason.

Thus I'll go first on my artificial crappie baits.

I guess I've caught more fish on the standard 2-3 inch curly tail grubs. Don't matter who makes them. I've bought them at fishing shows with no name brands in bulk and caught plenty of fish on 'em. Everybody makes them though.

I am simple in them...like them in one color and one color only. Lime/sparkle. Rigged on various size round jig heads. Used for either swimming it back to the boat or trolling.

And next fast becoming my favorites. Those Yum baits. I like of course, the Wooly curl tails and the Wolly Beavertails.

Not tried the 2" version of the Beavertails as of yet. I have some bought but just not used them. I've been using the 1.5 inch ones though and have caught crappie and stripe on every color of them I've bought. I am partial to two colors as of now: Red/Chartuese & Black/Pink.

Just ordered the Bobby Garland Slab Slay'rs in that Electric Chicken color. LOL it looked good on the color chart anyway. Also ordered some of those Panfish Assassins in the above color as well.
 
Here is what I use for crappie, in no particular order. 2" pearl minnows when I want to swim the bait. Ringer stingers, panfish assassins (crystal shad, albino shad, and s&p shad), 1.5" southern pro worms, tubes for floater fishing and occasionally will use a crappie pup under a pear floater. I used to use curly tailed grubs only. You can still catch a ton of fish on them when the fish are active. Not so good when the fish are neutral or in a negative mood.

I buy mostly pearl/white colors and dye them to whatever whim I happen to have on that particuar day. I have 5 different colors of garlic spike-it and can make a couple more colors by using 2 different colors. eg. hot pink and chartreuse will make hot orange. I experiment a lot.

At one time in my fishing life, I had every color and shape of bait that there was and noticed that I hardly ever used some colors and basically wasted money buying them. So that is the reason for the way I prepare for crappie fishing now. The garlic spike-it goes a long way and I only color the baits 3 or 4 at a time. I don't color a lot as they will bleed on white baits if stored with them for any length of time. I find it better just to color 3 or 4 at a time. It doesn't take but a few seconds to dip the tails in the spike-it.

BTW, panfish assassins may be the best lure for shooting docks. Compact and when you use a little subtle "palsy" twitch every few seconds, it triggers many strikes. You have to watch your line though. Most strikes are visual. Ringer stingers are rapidly becoming my favorite bait. Seems to catch bigger fish for me, but I also catch smaller crappie on them too. emoGeezer
 
hoggerhead - 2/6/2008 2:04 PM

got a question dk, what is spike-it?
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It is a dye that comes in a small plastic bottle. Different colors and some are garlic flavored. Some are without flavor. Drys very quickly and won't wash off the plastic lure after dipping. Cost about 4.95 per bottle and last forever unless you spill it like I do from time to time. emoBigsmile emoGeezer
 
Didnt see you limit the choices to artificial lures, but you should not for get live minnows. From my experience, you are not really intending to catch crappie if you dont have minnows.
 
sprestwood - 2/6/2008 2:23 PM

Didnt see you limit the choices to artificial lures, but you should not for get live minnows. From my experience, you are not really intending to catch crappie if you dont have minnows.
Click to expand...

emoBigsmile Drumking never uses minnows and catches more crappie in a years time than probably any 5 people on this forum. I don't use minnows either and although I don't catch near as many as Drumking I catch all I need and then some. My favorite baits are panfish assassins, Southern Pro Hot Grubs, Tripple Ripples, mostly thrown on 1/32 or 1/16 oz minnow heads painted red or hot pink. If I had to pick a favorite color it would be John Deere green followed closely by bubblegum/chartruse.
 
I was mostly interested in the artificial area of the crappie world. Using live minnows for them is a whole different subject. I have just started to rig me up some Kentucky Lake Rigs for doing some vertical deep water probing. I'll give that a shot. A lot of those legendary crappie fisherman still call it their "bread and butter" crappie catching machine. I just hate stopping at a store on the way to go fishing to grab a bucket of minnows. I like having everything bought and ready to roll without any stops except for the boat ramp.

Oh yeah I got a question for you guys.

I notice folks like Jim Duckworth going on about those red hooks all the time. I guess this is more of an observation than a question but here goes anyway. You see the red fishing line advertisements that says that the color red disappears under water at so many feet, thus the selling point of the line is that it appears invisible to the fish. But when tackle companies put the red hooks on their lures, they claim it helps the fish see the lure under water. So which is true...more visible or invisible?!
 
the red line is transparent, and the hooks are opaque. I personally believe that the fish can see the red line in clear water, but probably can not in dirty water
 
You are right about the red hooks and red line. It doesn't seem possible for both claims to be true. I have always believed that most claims like those are intended to hook "fishermen" and not always the fish. I don't use either product.
 
the red line is not worth using at all in my opinion. it seems to birdnest a lot on spinning reels, i know all lines do it but seems to be a lot more often with the cajun red. it may be ok on baitcast reels as i have not tried on them. as for red hooks i have used the red, bronze and even black and can't say one gets more bites than the other.
 
i like to use the slider grubs in tennesse shad or chertreuse colors. i also have bought all the colors of assasins and have yet to catch a crappie on them, maybe i just don't know the technique. i also like a black/green tube and have had great luck with them.
 
I use the assassins and minijigs in all colors. Prefer the old fashioned shad color. DK/cheeze/FA taught me the dipping in Spike it... it does work when the bite is slow.
My whole life when I really need to catch one the flourescent pink doesn't let me down.
My Dad put on a little exhibition at the week of Christmas on a farm pond. He tried 10 different colors, due to a thread the week prior to Christmas. Dad says when they are biting, they'll bite any color. He proved it. Presentation, in my opinion, creates the bite when they aren't "feeding". Such as DK's "palsy twitch".
 
hoggerhead - 2/6/2008 2:19 PM

That might be worth piddling with. Do you usually die just the tail of the plastic jig or the main body?
Click to expand...

Sometimes I just dye the head, but most times I just dye the tail. With the panfish assassins, I only dye the tail. With the minnow or tubes, either head or tail. A few times I create multicolor jigs by coloring the head one color and the tail another. The southern pro 1.5" worms are deadly if you dye the head half blue and the tail half either chartreuse or lime. Smallmouth like them too.

A comment that I'd like to make about live bait fishing with minnows. That is really "cheating" and I never do it. emoPoke emoBigsmile There will be very few days in the year when someone will outcatch me using minnows. I'm not bragging. But when I make comments like this, it brings to mind that confidence in what you are doing is more important than the lure/bait that you are using. A few weeks ago, JWAteacher and I went crappie fishing and he brought along minnows. He caught about 3 or 4 fish using minnows and the crappie ate up the plastics.

If you believe that you will catch more crappie using minnows, then by all means, get you a bucket full of minnows. Don't let me talk you into doing anything that you have no confidence in. But, when you learn how to successfully present a stinger or assassin to a crappie, then they will bite it when they don't even want to. emoBigsmile But you can't catch crappie from your bathtub. The 3 secrets to fishing success. Location, location, location. emoTeacher emoBigsmile emoGeezer
 
I've got a few of the Stingers as well. I've caught crappie on them and like those too. In retrospect I reckon that's all those Slab Slayr's really are. I've caught most of my fish on them just letting them fall on light jigheads and doing nothing action wise.

A Kentucky Lake rig is more the less what the bass guys call "drop shotting". It was around for crappie long before the bass guys took it over. You put a heavy bell sinker on the bottom. I like a 3/4 oz but some guys go for the 1 - 2 ouncers. Then about 18" above the sinker you put a standard loop knot in the line and thread an arbedine minnow hook onto the loop. Then about 12-18 inches above that hook, you put another loop knot and put another hook on it. It's also known as the "double hook rig". You'll put minnows on the hooks and simply fish the thing off the side of the boat vertically. Great for probing channel ledges, brush, and stumps in deeper water. The double hooks aren't really for catching two fish at a time, but more to see what depth the fish are suspending over. You keep contact with the bottom and cover with the heavy sinker and walk it around on the bottom and let the minnows do the rest.
 
spring and summer 1.5 and 2 redchart oarngechart blackchart tubes fall and winter 1.5 and 2 pearl pearlchart.panfish assassins and crappie stingers.;) emoFish emoAngler
 

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