Bluegill on a crappie minnow

[Dan Thiem]

Does it seem wierd that I can catch a gill on a crappie minnow. I have been doing real good on gills this year with Marmooska tipped with a waxie. But, recently on a perch adventure while jigging teardops with crappie minnows, a couple big gills fell to the presentation.

I don't know, does this seem unconventional to anybody?

[toonfish]

I've had the same thing a few times out this year

[Quackaddict9]

well I had a crappie minnow on a bro bug jig and a 9" bluegill inhaled it, watched it on camera. I have had ohter times when they tried to but couldnt get it all, but this one had a big enough of mouth to take it all. Biggest bluegill I've caught through ice. It was fun!

[Keith_MN]

Dan,

When I am ice fishing for sunfish I actually like to drop a line in my second hole with a small minnow on it. I haven't caught many on the minnow, but the bigger sunnies just love to come and pester the heck out of it at times. And once the sunnies are there, I just have to fool them into biting my waxie, etc.

[mtreno]

we hammer them in the spring with them. nice cause you only get the real big ones....

[metrojoe]

I'm always surprised myself when it happens, but I have to agree it's always the bulls.

[Dan Thiem]

Quote:

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nice cause you only get the real big ones....

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Good point! A lot of times I find myself weeding through the smaller ones when using waxies, just trying to target the bigger ones.

[ozzie]

I have done real well in the spring for gills with crappie minnows. They will amaze you when you catch a little sunny on a crappie minnow bigger than their head. That being said I always hit the lake with a 1/2 scoop of crappies even when I go stricktly for gills. This year the biggest sunny I have caught came on a crappie minnow while I was catching smaller sunnies with waxxies.

[DigitalFisherman]

My fishing partner and I discovered by accident that the sumo gills in out favorite honey hole go crazy for crappie minnows and jumbo leaches. I never would have thought that it would be an effective way to catch them but that is now how we target them. We have even caught gills on shiners while walleye fishing on this lake. Needless to say, we dont spend much time walleye fishing anymore.

[Dan Thiem]

In the summer my son caught a gill on a Skitter-pop fishing for bass! Really!

[Tyler Holm]

How about this...

This 8" gill hit a #13 floating Rapala while it was sitting motionless on top of the water. We were top water fishing for bass, and would twitch the lure every few seconds. This gill came up and hammered the lure. It was caught by the middle treble hook in its mouth.

[Skitterpop]

I caught the one in my picture on a angel eye and a crappie minnow hooked through the back. In the early spring when targeting crappie I catch a lot of sunfish with minnows.

[hanson1287]

I have really good luck with them in the spring. When trolling on the Zumbro for crappies, 8-10" gills will hammer that minnow like a white bass. It's always a fun time with gills.

[delmuts]

they will eat it if they can get it in their mouth. seen several caught on plastic worms texas rigged.

[Ritz]

Well, throughout the years, i have caught many bluegills on crappie minnows...

[john.wells]

A few years ago I netted some shiners on Otter lake near Centerville and went out fishing there. It was early spring, just a day after ice out and I worked the shallows on the north end. I wasn't getting anything, but the wind turned dead calm and I saw some bait fish roiling and schooling in one little area. I figured crappies MUST be pushing these minnows around. So I quietly made my way over and threw a bobber rig set shallow with a 2 inch hand harvested shiner close to the school. Right away; a take- I set the hook and had one crazy fight right off the bat! I knew it wasn't a crappie-too aggresive and erratic. I figured a smaller bass or pike. My eyes nearly blew out of my skull when I saw the size of that sunny! It wasn't the only one- I pulled nearly 30 of these beasts in, on SHINERS up to 3 inches long! I released every one of them, but I think I should have kept a few, as I have tried many times since to duplicate that day with no real success. Otter gets super weed choked in the summer, so it doesn't get much pressure, and it tends to have a lot of winter kills, and I am sure that is what happened to those brutes. Needless to say, I don't think it is an anamoly to get sunnnies on minnows-it happens all the time, and nicer ones to boot.

[Fever]

A lot of weird sunny stories out there. After reading the previous posts figured I'd chip in with mine... Last August while fishing Lg mouth on lake Sylvia just west of Annandale I inticed a 10 inch pumkinseed to hit a 10 inch texas rigged worm.... Beautiful fish. I was a bit surprised that the worm hook was able to do the job on that little mouth. What was that thing thinking????

[Cliff Wagenbach]

Big Gills tend to be meat eaters!

I have caught a lot of my biggest gills while using minnows for crappies.

Cliff

[CrappieJohn]

Over 40 years ago (literally) I fished an old gravel pit that had a hump in it withing casting distance from shore. I used a three inch Hula Popper, red and white one, to try and catch bass out there, but caught more sunfish on that thing than the bass.