Hey Matt!

[BrianF]

Matt

In another thread, you mentioned you used plastics 90% of the time for ice crappies. How do you recommend using these when over deep water? Say, 40 feet deep? Do you attach them to a dropper on a spoon? Otherwise, it would take forever for those things to get down there.

Also, I think you and Tom use collar-less jigs with your paddle tails in the open water season? Good collar-less jigs are tough to find! What type are you using and where do you get them? I've looked all over for these.

Brian

[CrappieJohn]

Brian....

I can answer the jighead question. Seems to be a popular one here at home today too.

FM's own TackleCity sells the ScenicTackle collarless heads. 1/32 ounce is the king-pin for me. Jeff at Scenic can also help you out and you will find him very easy to work with....just go to Scenic's HSOforum for a number to call or use the e-mail.

Colors? Purple,black,chartreuse and maybe a few hot orange.

[eyepatrol]

Quote:

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Seems to be a popular one here at home today too.

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That's my fault!

[CrappieJohn]

Not all by yourself, dude. I have answered 11 mails with this same line of questioning today.

[eyepatrol]

You must get quite a number of e-mails at home! I try and not e-mail too often just because I don't like bothering people's private e-mails and such, but I had some questions which I thought were better e-mailed than putting up as a post.

Thanks for the help today CT. I'm looking forward to using those jigs come open water. Now I just gotta go back through the post history of this forum and start reading and writing down notes on tips for early ice-out and pre-spawn pannies. My favorite kind of reading!

[CrappieJohn]

You can mail me any time you want, no bother at all.

For me, some of the most aggressive crappie fishing is just down the road, weather-wise. We have had some good rains here today with much more forcast yet and much warmer temps to accompany the rains. I can just about see the ice goin! Yeeeeeessssss!!!!!!!!!!!

For me it will be sharp breaklines and points to get started. 5 feet deep the float gets set. Junebug/chartreuse Paddletail or the purple Stub. What an adventure this early open water is!

[Matt Johnson]

Brian,

There are a few options here...

First off, you can upsize your plastic to like a size 6 Ratso, which will drop quicker than the smaller baits.

Two, you can use a small profiled, heavy style jig like the Wolfram Jig from Your Bobbers Down, or the Optic Stealth Jig from Little Atom. Both of these jigs fish "small," but drop quickly. Plastics can be applied to both of these jigs.

Or three, you can use some sort of split-shot or something to get the plastic down to the desired depth.

Usually I never have to go with route three. A lot of times I can just upsize to the size 6 Ratso and it will get the job done. Or else option two will work just fine as well...

[eyepatrol]

Yeah, I'm getting pretty excited about open water too, especially after reading and writing 2 full pages of notes here, and that's just from posts in March/April of 2003!! Writer's cramp! 'doh!

I'm a little torn though between open water and ice fishing. These past couple weekends I've been on a pretty decent crappie bite, and all I "know" so far is hardwater crappie fishing. Hence, the reason I'm preparing for open water. But hey, as long as I get out, it really doesn't matter what state the water is in, I'm a happy guy!