July 2, 2025 crappie report

Phil and I had an early morning crappie fishing trip with our friends from Oliver Springs who came down to fish Chickamauga reservoir with us. We put them on our prime spot and Phil and I fished different structures that were nearby. One friend named Jeff has been learning how to crappie fish and this morning he caught his PB crappie, a 14.25”, 2 lb crappie and another 1.52 pound, 13.75” black crappie. He is a happy camper this morning.

Crappie are not supposed to be line shy and I said that most of my fishing life, but the past two years have about changed my mind about that theory. This morning I was fishing with a 6 lb test fluorocarbon leader tied to Sufix 6 lb Nanofil braided line. Phil was tied directly to his 4 lb hi vis yellow braided line and after I caught the first 5 fish and both of us using the same lure, he said that maybe he ought to tie a leader on his line.

He did just that and on the first cast, using the same lure as before and the same bluff structure that we were fishing, he caught a nice crappie over 13” long. He caught several more fish this morning.

There are several different knots that join braid to fluorocarbon and the one that I use is simplest to tie and is what I call a surgeon’s knot with 3 passes over the loop vs the normal two passes. It works for me and is the smallest knot as well. Easy to tie in windy conditions while out on the water.