How to fish this lake for pannies...........

[dudewheresmyboat]

Over the weekend I fished a small lake in WI. The lake is small and flows into a big river. I've iced this lake with out much success. There have been some real nice crappies caught during ice. (12-15inchers) I fished this lake saturday and did quite well but only in one spot. This has no structure. I was throwing out a small jerk bait and roadrunner searching for larger crappies with no success. My brother was throwing a crappie jig with a bobber with no fish caught either. The only place I found fish was in the creek channel going into another small lake before exiting out to the river. The lake is shallow averaging 3-4 feet, with the deepest part being 9ft. There are some stumps in there and I don't really want to take the big boat out, as I was going to scan with SI. We caught over 200 crappies with majority of them being white crappies. We fished a brushpile, water was about 5feet deep with brush top to bottom. Pannies were holding on the outer edge and inside the brush pile. While searching for crappies with the road runner, I caught a 2.5lb bass and a mid 30's esox. The lake is aerated with the ice maxing out at 3-5inches at best.

What are your thoughts?

What are your tactics??

Any tips on where and how to look for crappies on this particular lake?

Thanks!!

[dudewheresmyboat]

60 some views and NO comment? Come-on!

[uppdacreek]

60 some views and NO comment? Come-on!

Get used to that!

[DHanson]

Sounds like you figured it out! 200+ crappies, what else could you ask for?

[ec30_06]

Inlets are usually warmer water and hold crappies early spring.

[dudewheresmyboat]

Thanks for the reply guys! yeah 200 is a good number, it was a hoot catching them! But i'm searching for the bigger ones (over 13inches). I know they are in there have seen bigger ones caught than what I caught. Maybe they roam all day?? I started on the North Shore working my way east than south to west, nothn.

[tacklebox7FF]

what time of day were you fishing for them? sometimes the bigger ones only bite at night or early morning.. usually the smaller ones are more aggressive and there more of them.. try fishing in the evening with lighted bobbers where the current comes into the lake during the evening hours through dark. that's what I would try

[onlydrakes4me]

Or try using bigger baits, might catch less fish but you would deffinatly weed out some of the smaller fish