Thread: Fall Crappie

If you think you should be in the deer stand, you should probably be on the lakes, crappie fishing. Fall IS the best time for crappies, in my opinion. They are aggressive to a jig around structure and on the breaks leading to the shallows. They are more concentrated in bigger schools in the late fall pattern then they are the spring. Get the boat out and get fishing!

I fish a lot of the same areas Spring through Fall and generally use jigs. Very rarely do we come back empty handed. Generally, it comes down to finding them and finding the right color. I wouldn't consider myself anything close to an expert though.

by the time the leaves start to change its full on. they will school up and put on the feed bag. like said after you find them toss them some jigs. i usually fish deep in the wood or outside edge of weeds, on a drop.

I spend more time tight lining jigs vertically in fall. Most of my fish come out of 8-12feet, and I usually catch as many as I want in fall. I haven't crappie fished this year at all, but I'm thinking about going tomorrow. Last 5 years I've hit the same waypoint every september-november and done really well.

I like the area I fish because it doesn't get hammered by others, and for whatever reason tends to hold good fish in the fall.

I think the spring is more fun, especially when you can fish in 1-2ft of water. I know areas I can find them like that in october, but size usually smaller than spring.

I love fishing in the fall. Less people on the lake. Like what has been said above. I love to use small jigs tipped with crappie nibbles. I have found that the pink nibbles works best. I went a week ago on Monday. I had purchased 3 dozen minnows and released almost 3 dozen into the lake. They would not touch a minnow. I was using small jigs on a 1/16 ounce head and they loved it once we found the color that they wanted. Some days you might have to switch colors a few times. I have found that from the time the water temps hit the mid 70's until the mid 50's I catch a lot of crappie. In both shallow water and in deeper water. I might not catch as many in the fall but they a larger fish.

What colors do you like, tubes or curly tails?
Bassky

My go to is a black and silver 2" curly tail grub. But I have a couple dozen color combos to sort through but I stock up on the black and silvers. Last few times out its been pink/purple, blue/silver, or black/blue/green. It varies. Usually my wife and I will use different colors and switch up periodically until we find the right combo. This year pink jig heads have been doing better than my normal black.

hunt in the morning....fish in the afternoon....or vice a versa. If you work at it you might find a place you can beach the boat and walk to a deer stand. Especially bowhunting.