Some Crappie action just north of the Cities

MN BassFisher · December 31, 2013

I was back in MN for the holidays and was able to get out on the ice twice. On both of the outings we targeted Crappies north of the cities. On 12/21 a group of friends and I hit West Rush Lake shortly after sunrise. We fished for about 5 hours and bounced around to a few different spots. Most of our time was spent in 34-40 fow. We would drill holes until our flashers lit up, drop jigs/spoons down, catch crappies for a steady hour, and then the flashers would slowly go blank. That was our queue to stay mobile! So we'd move and repeat this process about 4 times throughout the day. We caught Black Crappies, Sunfish, and Yellow Perch. The biggest Crappie of that outing was 11 1/2 inches.

On 12/28 I hit a much smaller lake in the area with a family friend. We targeted 14-19 fow and stayed mobile - switching our spots 4-5 times again. The crappies seemed to be on the move all day, the action would come in waves but the size and average fish was larger than the ones from Rush. We knew there were big crappies in the lake but they didn't show their faces on this outing. We caught over 60 fish that day on waxies, euros, and minnows. A good majority of these fish were in the 9-11" range and the biggest fish of that day were a couple crappies pushing close to 11 1/2". There were some nice sunnies mixed in as well - some over 9", and one bonus pike.

I miss Minnesota and fishing for warm water species - I should be back by next ice season.