Strange Place to find Crappies?

[LPCrowRiverFisherman]

Been fishing a couple of pits lately and decided to try the smallest pit again, hadn't been getting anything out of it except for a couple small perch and sunfish, well to we hit the hot spot. A friend just got a new vexilar and we started drilling holes and checking. Went from 6ft on one side to 12 ft in the middle and marked nothing. Went to the opposite side and set up in 4.5 to 5 fow. We marked a few fish, thinking sunfish and perch I stuck down the waxworm and bam, crappie, I didn't even know there were crappies in there and we found them in the strangest area. 4-5 ft deep with a small layer of stringy weeds on the bottom, ended up catching lots of crappies mixed with sunnies. Why so shallow? Not much for drop offs in the pit, and it gets to 12-13 fow.

[blackdog1101]

Were you on the north side of the pit? If so the water there may be a couple degrees warmer. Even a degree or two will make a difference. Warmer water equals more invertebrates, more inverts equals more baitfish.

[leech~~]

Lp, Size?

[123fish]

That's interesting Lp. I'm fishing the same thing as you and the fish that were in 11 FOW are gone other than small perch and the occasional sunnie. I know the crappies are there as I caught them last winter. Have not tried that shallow but I'm going to now. Any certain time of the day you were fishing?

[bustin lips]

I have found some bigger (9-11") crappies on a metro lake in 5-7' while everybody else is in 20-25' catching 4-6" fish.

[LPCrowRiverFisherman]

Went out again today, they were more scattered today, drilled more to see if there were at different depths. Wouldn't mark anything deeper than 6 ft and nothing shallower than 4.5 ft. Crappies were scattered and in the end we found a spot about 10-15 ft away from yesterday, and ended up catching a few. We are not keeping any because the pond is only about 2 acres and we have no idea how many crappies are in there, and the keeper sized ones are few. Most crappies are between 7 and 9 inches. Also caught a couple Orange-Spotted Sunfish.

[Scott M]

The pits are somewhere off the Crow I'm guessing? Orange spots are a river species. Are the crappies whites? Seasonal flooding deal most likely, maybe with some winterkill so the fish are usually on the small side?

Good report.