I’ve caught a lot of fish in my lifetime but some of you have caught more crappie a day than I have in total. Regardless of fish species that I’m fishing for, I like the lightest rod that I feel I can get by with. Having said that I will not use an ultra light rod if it has no backbone. If I whip it back and forth and the blank moves a little all the way down to the handle, I won’t buu that rod unless I’m buying it for bream fishing.

My favorite crappie poles have a good backbone and a very very fast tip. They’ll load up pretty well down a little over 1/3 of the way back from the tip.