Thread: Shad

Where I fish in MS...Sardis and Enid....the white crappie follow the smaller shad and eat them.....I look for shad on my fishfinder and thats the areas I troll.

Originally Posted by "G"

Where I fish in MS...Sardis and Enid....the white crappie follow the smaller shad and eat them.....I look for shad on my fishfinder and thats the areas I troll.

Normally I do the same thing, I guess it may have been so many shad that the fish didn't want a jig. I tried minnows to and it was hard to catch a fish.

Originally Posted by Andrews

Normally I do the same thing, I guess it may have been so many shad that the fish didn't want a jig. I tried minnows to and it was hard to catch a fish.

It looks hard. Lol.

I think a super abundance of natural food makes fish fill up fast and nap a lot.

Originally Posted by mermentau

I think a super abundance of natural food makes fish fill up fast and nap a lot.

Yes it does....but it also makes them HUGE!
We are facing this in our home lake also....you just have to make your bait look easier and more appetizing to them.....this is why I throw swimbaits, it allows you to mimic shad, you can make the swimbaits look injured, dying, etc., by slow retrieving, bottom bouncing, twitching, stop and start retrieving, etc.!
A Crappie will take a shad that is almost half it's body length...the bigger the meal the less a Crappie has to hunt, and the more size it will put on quickly....this is considered a healthy lake...it's just tougher to fish for most!