Crappie Locations

[fisherdog19]

As the season trods on, what is the typical pattern for crappies. Do they typically move out over deeper water and stay away from shallower water or move in and out? Trying to get some idea of where to locate them as the season progresses, especially at night? Thanks for any info.

There is an outside chance that I will be in the cities the weekend of the 24th, anyone want to hook up and chase some slabs?

Fisherdog

[CrappieJohn]

I'd stay on the deep water and by now, just about give up on weeds. Some lakes may show some lingering weed action, but it should be about over. When we get nice warm nights and the shorelines begin to show water and the ice gets honeycombed a bit you should begin looking in bays with northern shore exposures from about noon until dark and later. The craps and bulls will begin a daytime relationship to the warming water to be found in those bays. After dark and first thing in the morning I'd seek the deepest water in the immediate area of those bays and concentrate on it. I would would leave the delicate stuff at home and use minnows on about everything I dropped down the hole,be it a spoon , teardrop, or plain hook.

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Plastics...making better fishermen without bait! Good Fishing Guys! CrappieTom
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[united jigsticker]

Like Tom said, the deep water is the key for the month of January. Activity levels, and height of suspended activity will vary with weather conditions and times of day, but for the most part, the fish are going to maintain there positions int he deeper basin areas right now.

Come February, I start looking back on the insides of the deeper breaks, but typically only during extreme low pressure weather situations. By the insides of the deeper breaks I mean, the first flat after the the first main break as you come out of the deeper water.

Often times in February, during these lows, I typically catch some of my biggest Crappies up on these types of structure.

When the ice starts to honeycomb, water runs, and melting occurs in March, then its time to head back for the shallower breaks, weed edges, and even weed beds for Crappies and especially Gills.

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Good fishing,
UJ
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[Matt Johnson]

I agree, deeper water and off shallow structure towards mainlake structure. Catching big slabs gets harder as winter wears on and the frenzy might not pick up until late ice, but you can still find them and catch them, but it may take more effort to find them.

I like to move off of classic early ice spots and find the nearest deeper water structure and transition areas. Often times these areas will hold the migrating crappies first, then they will explore the expansive mainlake basin insearch of new stomping grounds. I like areas where you have middepth structure in unision with deeper water, that way the crappies can relate to the structure and drift off it to suspend and feed at dusk. When you are on crappies during the day and they quit as dusk apporaches, sometimes it only takes a 30 yard move to be back on fish at dusk. And then there are those spots that give up crappies throughout most of the day (those are the honey holes ).

Sometimes you will find crappies suspending over really deep holes, like 60-70 foot holes. The crappies won't typically decline into those depths but they will suspend inline with nearby structure or flats. So if you are fishing a flat in 30 feet of water and there is a deep hole that drops into 50 feet nearby, you might find those crappies suspended over the deep hole 20 feet off bottom. Same goes for humps, bars, or points in deeper water. Look for crappies to suspended at the same depth as the tops of these structure areas but out in deeper water.

If you are fishing a smaller lake that is not too deep then look for the deepest holes and hit those spots. If the hole is basically structueless then pinpointing those crappies can be difficult, especially on lakes that are bowl shaped with no structure. If there is structure, then those areas should be targeted.

Locating midwinter crappies can take some time, but grab a lake map and look for likely fish holding spots. Use the early ice spots and figure out a plan of attack. Find deeper water near early ice holding spots, then go from there.

Good Fishin,
Matt Johnson

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[CrappieJohn]

Something else that may help...The lake I fish is more reservoir than actual lake. It has a current all year which will influence those fish. During the deep winter, I go back to the same water that the craps were in during the extreme heat of the summer. The difference is that during the summer warmth and the presence of a thermocline the fishs' movements were horizontal because of that layered water and thier relationship to the thermocline, as oppose to now with a consistant water temp( or very near to it) from top to bottom they will move in that direction- up and down and not so much horizontally. As the winter wears on, the fish will begin to gradually move more and more in a horizontal fash, not because the water is changing temps so much as it is because of the need to begin getting to the areas in which they mate. The schools of crappie will begin to spread out some. The fish that are actively making this flat transition are not feeding fish, BUT they will feed vertically. All the while this movement is going on, they are yet relating to deep water. To make a point of how strong this mating urge can be, I have ice fished an area where there were no fish intentionally...just to show the lack of crappies at that site during the hard water. But as soon as the ice was cracked up enough to cast a jig, I did so and caught some very large male fish. As soon as Feb. rolls around, the fish will get antsy and begin drifting out of the super deep water pockets and start to follow the deep water channels, so it is only logical that to stay on fish you need to understand how the season, day length, water depth, water temp...just a whole lot comes into play. That is what makes the crappie a tough nut to crack.

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Plastics...making better fishermen without bait! Good Fishing Guys! CrappieTom
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[fisherdog19]

Thanks for the input guys. I was out this evening and set up in 19' at about 6pm, stayed for about an hour and caught one crappie so I decided to move out to 23' and from about 7-9:30pm I caught about 20 crappies. Most off the bottom but the bigger ones came in at different depths. They were very aggresive and wanted minnows, they wouldn't hit the waxies like the minnows. Fishing slowed down after 9:30pm and we only caught 4 more crappies until midnight when we decided to pack it in. It sure is fun to get into them like that, as this was my first time catching more than 2 crappies through the ice. Thanks for all of your expert knowledge guys, I'll be chasing slabs more often now.

Fisherdog