Commentary
Minnows are no substitute for crappie jigs You may have heard anglers say excitedly, “The crappie are on the bank,” but this term can have various meanings. For instance, I’ve fished for crappie on the bank with …
– The fish in less than a foot of water with their dorsal fins jutting out of the water,
– The fish holding in water 4 feet deep and
– The crappie in 10 feet or more of water.
Whatever your definition of the crappie on the bank, this time of year has perfect water temperatures for the crappie to concentrate in shallow water. If you fish shallow-water bays in spawning areas or in oxbow lakes where you’ll find the water temperature often two to five degrees warmer than the water temperature in the main lake, you may catch crappie less than an inch below the surface.
I’ve fished before with a round cork one inch up from the hole in the hook from where I’ve tied the line and caught crappie. You’ll generally have the most success beside a rock or a piece of submerged wood, since both absorb heat and transfer that heat into the water. On a bright sunny day, the water right next to a fallen tree may register a half a degree to a full degree warmer than the water in the rest of the bay.
In the spring, I like to fish with minnows, but I’m much more effective with jigs. I prefer to use an ultralight spinning reel with 6- to 8-pound-test line and a 1/16- or a 1/32-ounce jig. I’ll reel the jig to the end of the pole and then put the jig in a hole between the branches of a fallen tree or next to a shallow-water stump. Next I’ll lower the jig into the water and move it up and down and sideways. If a crappie attacks, then I’ll worry about how I’ll get my pole, my line and my jig out of those thick-cover areas.
Even when I use minnows to fish for crappie, I’ll always take a jig pole with me as well as two to three dozen crappie jigs. One spring as I fished on the Tombigbee River in central Alabama, I’d caught very few crappie until about 3 p.m. I’d pulled into a shallow bay and found some tree tops in about two to three feet of water. Each time I dropped a fresh minnow next to those brush tops, crappie from 1 to 21/2 pounds would attack, which made my day one that every crappie angler would dream of having.
Finally when I only had three minnows left in my bucket, I started recycling each of those minnows two to five times – even though the minnows had expired after the second crappie I caught on them. I’d jiggle and shake my line to make the minnows appear lively – hoping the crappie still would eat them.
When my last minnow looked like a piece of rope stretched between two pit bulls in a game of tug of war, I knew my great crappie-fishing day had come to an end. However, I dug into my tackle box and found four well-worn crappie jigs. I pieced the jigs together with super glue and then continued to catch crappie on the jigs until I caught my limit, making that day one of the finest crappie-fishing trips I’d ever had.
If you plan to hit the lakes and rivers soon, don’t forget to take along a few extra crappie jigs, even if you plan to fish with minnows. Never leave big slab crappie wanting to bite just because you don’t have any jigs with you.
Contact John Phillips of the Birmingham Post-Herald in Alabama at http://www.postherald.com.