Lets discuss this option and its popularity both ways . I will for sure use whatever I think is available that will put the most fish on my hook and for many decades never liked feathers or plastics and actually cut feathered jigs down to just a jig head back when . My favorite way to ketch crappie was a half minnow or whole one put on as a jig body .
Of course now a days I use jigs 99.9% of the time ,but to be sure I still in tough situations tip them with things . Minnows are flat deadly on crappie in many cases and I have seen them make a jig look like it needs to be back on the store shelf .
But to be sure just as minnows are deadly such is the case I have found with jigs. Lets start with when and where approach .
Minnows are for sure NOT a winter time bait from what I have seen . I watch folks several times a week sit and ketch nothing or one or 2 at most while the winter jig fellas are slaughtering the crappie . The largest crappie ever managed at that local water body was by a almost minnow only fella back last spring at a hair under 3 lbs. But this same fella was at the fish house this weekend and using minnows as were 3 other people and combined they managed 3 crappie . The other 8 guys using jigs probably managed somewhere in the area of 300 to 400 crappie combined at the same time the folks with the minnows were there .
One thing for certain though in just 2 months this will turn around and the minnow folks will make the jig folks on many days feel like they cant ketch diddly and I have seen this before as well .
So never assume I don't like minnows and or care one way or the other about if you use minnows , I say use what works when and where and ketch them how ever you prefer .
in the end its about ketchn fish for me and not what or how you go about it,
keep in mind this , because I don't use minnows don't mean I haven't ...
and or wont if it seems I cant "ketchup" ....
and yes they bit any color I dropped for 4 hours straight like I was on an episode of some kind of fishing show as well this weekend
4 am to 8 am and off to church I went