Thread: Green

colayn,

Hate to speak for Chucky but i think he means crappie can suspend real shallow over deep water in the dead of summer. Once the thermocline sets up to say at 20ft of water, then you are wasting your time looking for crappie below 20 ft. Even though they are over top brush in 60 ft of water they may only be suspended 10 ft deep in 60 ft b/c the best oxygenated water is from 20 ft and above so you can find what depth they are suspending and catch em all over the lake by paying attn to depth of thermocline and fish. You can see the thermocline on your sonar if you have your sensitivity turned up right. Hope this helps a little. You can look for big shad schools too in summer and find em.

Exactly what ekyslabber has said. I was in a hurry and left out two words " dose'nt mean that the crappie go deep" sorry. Green is a funny lake. You have to play with it in the summertime. Over the years I have caught fish as shallow as 8ft with water temps being 85-88 or as deep as 22-28ft. Plan on playing more this summer around the main lake. But there has allways been one or two factors. Some type of structure, brush, ledges ect. and the bait fish. The bait fish will seek out structure themselves in the summertime. The two are usually not far from each other.

Originally Posted by ekySlabber

colayn,

Hate to speak for Chucky but i think he means crappie can suspend real shallow over deep water in the dead of summer. Once the thermocline sets up to say at 20ft of water, then you are wasting your time looking for crappie below 20 ft. Even though they are over top brush in 60 ft of water they may only be suspended 10 ft deep in 60 ft b/c the best oxygenated water is from 20 ft and above so you can find what depth they are suspending and catch em all over the lake by paying attn to depth of thermocline and fish. You can see the thermocline on your sonar if you have your sensitivity turned up right. Hope this helps a little. You can look for big shad schools too in summer and find em.

OK thanks, I thought that is what you mean't but wanted to make sure.
Hope to get back over there this weekend and try to improve my quality vs quanity problem.
Holler at me if you ever see me out, older blue /grey Skeeter with a Yamaha. Usually have one of my sons (10 and 12) with me and if its sunny I will have a full bremed hat on. I'll be the tall, skinny ugly one.

Good fishing to ya,

I'll hollar if i see ya. I will be in a tanish 170 fisher with a 90 mercury op spider rigging. Fat boy on the front usually white t-shirt and shorts. Going to try and come down and fish Fri thru Sun if i can get the project i am on done in time. Not sure where i will be fishing at yet since i have not been back since the floods. I guess i will let the water temps tell me where and go from there. Good luck.

Originally Posted by colayn

OK thanks, I thought that is what you mean't but wanted to make sure.
Hope to get back over there this weekend and try to improve my quality vs quanity problem.
Holler at me if you ever see me out, older blue /grey Skeeter with a Yamaha. Usually have one of my sons (10 and 12) with me and if its sunny I will have a full bremed hat on. I'll be the tall, skinny ugly one.

Good fishing to ya,

Just because you see shad on the fishfinder doesnt mean that fish is there at the time. Depending on how the shad show up should influence whether you fish or not. If the shad arent spread out then CHANCES are fish arent feeding on them. alot of times ive been with people fishing and they say find the shad find the fish... not always fish do go where the food goes but they may school up around 1 school of shad and follow, you may find a school of shad and catch 2 fish and sometimes thats just fish falling behind a school that take up with the school your fishing. Finding the shad is most critical when trolling open water and thats when you will catch your white crappie 14 foot deep in 50 ft of water, when they are feeding on shad the thermocline really affects the shad more than the fish (except gar and carp ) and the fish just follow suit and stay with the food. Green has alewives in it and they are quite different from gizzard shad hence your open water crappie. Between me and 3 of my buddies we caught almost 3000 keeper crappie last year ( meaning 9 inches) while trolling.

hey chucky look for me on friday i plan to be there. wondering if you have heard anything about the tourneys this year.

i dont agree on the 20 fish limit on green but i do agree with the 10" size limit or even 11" size limit

This is true as well. Not every school of bait fish is going to have fish on them. I did not mean that. But what i did mean is the right set up for bait fish with some type of structure. Before the floods last year in May me ,my son and a buddy limited out every friday, saturday and sunday for 11 weekends straight. We even told joey the owner of holmes bend where to go. All we did was follow the schools of bait fish from the main lake all the way back past the bridge toward snake creek. Then after the floods went down and the heat cranked up we went to night fishing for a couple of months. Finding the schools with the right structure and we would limit out in just a couple of hours. Good luck and keep a slayin them.Thumbs Up

Originally Posted by slabslayer1

Just because you see shad on the fishfinder doesnt mean that fish is there at the time. Depending on how the shad show up should influence whether you fish or not. If the shad arent spread out then CHANCES are fish arent feeding on them. alot of times ive been with people fishing and they say find the shad find the fish... not always fish do go where the food goes but they may school up around 1 school of shad and follow, you may find a school of shad and catch 2 fish and sometimes thats just fish falling behind a school that take up with the school your fishing. Finding the shad is most critical when trolling open water and thats when you will catch your white crappie 14 foot deep in 50 ft of water, when they are feeding on shad the thermocline really affects the shad more than the fish (except gar and carp ) and the fish just follow suit and stay with the food. Green has alewives in it and they are quite different from gizzard shad hence your open water crappie. Between me and 3 of my buddies we caught almost 3000 keeper crappie last year ( meaning 9 inches) while trolling.