Shallow Crappies?

[chuckwagon]

I am a new b to fishing the open water ... I fish mostly west metro lakes and i am finding all my crappies to be in 1 to 5 ft depths? I was under the impression that crappies were in deeper waters suspended ? Just looking for info for a new b!

[kingfisherpat]

well ive always gone down by st cloud state dam

and catch crappies thire useing a small crappie,s jigs and just reeling it in slow and jig every now the ive always had luck in shallow is where i always catch them but try differant kinds of jigs maybe that will get them to bite

signd kingfisherpat...

[carpmanjake]

i have been catching alot of slabs in under 3 FOW

with the cool weather it seems like they are in a kind of in a fall feeding stage

[ozzie]

crappies will follow the forage...alot of forage in shallow around the weeds. They will start in the next month or so schooling and suspending over deeper water but until then shallow has been key for me the last 2 years in being succesful in catching crappies in open water

[fisherdog19]

They won't start suspending until the water cools of quite a bit and then through the winter. In the spring and summer you will typically find them along weedline breaks. This time of year they will move in shallow to feed and then head back to a little deeper water when finished, but usually not more than 15 fow depending on the weedline depth. They will get very aggressive in the weeks to come as they know winter is near.

[chuckwagon]

Thanks for the good info all ... I limited out on Sunday fairly easy so I am pretty reved up for some more crappie fishing!

[LOWinEYEin]

My 2cents..the lakes I fish, crappies start moving down deeper when the most of the leaves are off. Then you cant miss them on the Graph..During this time we have had some cold rain, wind and a couple weeks of cold weather.