central ar oxbow report

[randybenham]

I decided with the way the crappie had been doing, that I would try the green carp today here at the house. I had been playing around the bank this week with a spinnerbait (white w/ gold willow blades) & had been catching a couple & releasing them. The fish were shallow, & remained that way this morning 'till noon. I caught 5 bass the 1st hour in 2' of water or less very close to the bank on the same white spinnerbait. I wound up with 9 fish by noon. It was very productive. I had 3 fish over 3lbs, and all bites were good size keepers. Here are some of those keepers on the cleaning board I have at the house.




I decided to try to go for the crappie this afternoon, and the bit was very slooooow. I caught a small male that had turned black on a bed, either protecting the fry or making a bed. With the bite so slow, I decided to go check deep to see what I could come up with. I only had 1 good keeper, 1lb 12oz. She was pretty nice fish. Here she is along with the big green carp of the day, 3lb 9 oz.




The interesting thing about the fishing day today was the cleaning. Most all of the fish I caught today were females and about half of them had already dropped their eggs, including the big fish of the day. Interestingly enough, the big slab crappie had not dropped eggs yet. They were still light yellow, and didn't have a lot of blood vessels in it. With the way the spring has been, it wouldn't surprise me if the bass went 1st, but I am just afraid that the crappie spawn is done here on our lake. I've been watching these water temps like a hawk, and they've yet to get over 65 degrees. We have just not got the crappie moved up to the banks yet though. We'll have to wait & see what the rest of the spring holds. I'm off on vacation this week, and you can bet that I'll be on the water 4-5 days this week.

[slabbandit]

Thanks for the reports Randy! A guy at work and I are wanting to go to Clear Lake or Plum Bayou sometime this next week and try em.
Went to Shoal Bay on Lake Dardanelle today for a few hours around noon. No luck at all. Water temps were 57 up the creek to 60 degrees in the bay itself.
One or two different bass tournaments going on also.

[Jerry Blake]

Hey Randy:

There's still plenty of time for the crappie to spawn yet this spring. We found white crappie still spawning up to the middle of May last year after that cold spell we had in April. Even if the water temps get up to 70 they'll still spawn as long as it clears up enough so they can spawn deeper. All they need is stable water temps in the 60s, stable water level and stable weather and they'll get-r-done pretty quick.

[tommyboyrn]

I am still learning, but i have never heard of green carp, much less keeping any?
where do they predominantly inhabit? Good eating?

[randybenham]

Jerry,
I do hope you are right about spawn. I would love it if they decided to spawn this week with some stable weather here.

Tommy boy, it is a crappie.com joke with regard to bass. Us crappie guys like to put the crappie on a pedestal above the bass, despite the fact that bass is the "supposed" most popular fish. Anyway, it's part of the crappie lingo that you'll find here on the site.

[tommyboyrn]

oh okay, thanks. Learn something new everyday.

[adr17]

hey slabbandit... i went to plum bayou saturday, water temp was 60 to 63 almost everywhere we tried, we fished everywhere and at all depths and only managed to catch 1 small crappie and 1 small white bass. a group of guys caught 3 catfish on yoyos thats all i heard from everybody i talked to,,, there were alot of boats on clear lake and the bait shop had to go get more minnows at 10am, but she said she didnt know if they were catching anything

[randybenham]

I fished yesterday, exclusively for crappie. I wound up catching small male dink crappie, and a couple of decent females. I decided (since I'm off this week) to do some moonlight yo-yo'ing. I only put out 8 yo yos, because i didn't want to have to manage too many, chase down every dink that zips up, etc. I caught a few off the yo yos, and a few pole fishing at the same time early last night. The bites were very subtle, & a few I didn't even feel. technique: jig pole tightlining w/ a green/chartreuse jig tipped w/ either crappie nibbles, or a minnow. The fish I caught would start swimming sideways with the jig, & I noticed that they were doing the same to the yo yo's also. A few had fish on them, & weren't even tripped. ( dinks) Anyway, I got up this morning, & it was the same pattern. at 530, no fish on, & by 630, I had caught 4 on the dawn bite. It was the same situation, very little strike, if any. I wound up with 9 crappie total, not including the 8 or so dinks I caught during the night. Here is a pic of the mess of fish.





Here is me holding the 2 biggest ones. They were decent 1 to 1.5 lb fish, but I didn't weigh them.





Interestingly enough, most of the fish were female, and every single female had very runny eggs in them. It sure seemed like they were up spawning, just not very interested in feeding. Water temps here last night got up to 70, then cooled off to 65 this morning. no wind to speak of, (maybe light southeast breeze). Anyway, I've still got the rest of the week to continue hunting them down for their new home, camp maytag (freezer).

[ceb]

Just like everywhere else around central AR. Tough times right now...but glad to see that you are gettin' some good'uns. Be sure to keep us updated on post-spawn conditions. Those big ol' females will be gettin' hungry before long...

[adr17]

randy,, looks like you live on a lake, if you dont mind me asking which lake is it? couple of nice crappie you caught.