A buddy and I crappie fish weekly if not more here in NEO. We are on the lake from ice out in early March to ice up in Nov/Dec when ever it starts forming and salt is all over the roads. That's when I put the boat away as I don't want salt coating my trailer and boat.
Due to all my work travel in March, we didn't get out on the boat till the first week in April.
This year is definitely different than last year.
2021 water level was at winter pool till late April/early May. 2022 water at or slightly above full pool in early March.
2021 water temps slowly increased each week. 2022 water temps stayed low and then jumps 10 degrees and then back down 10 degrees, then slowly rose 5 degrees then back down. A yo yo on temps for sure.

2021 we slayed the crappie and the amount caught increased each weekend almost without fail. Also caught quite a few white bass sometimes outnumbering the numbers of crappie we caught those days.
2022 we started slow and we are increasing the numbers each week but sometimes fall back depending on the water temps. Only 1 white bass this year but we are killing the bluegills. Gills have been spawning for three weeks shooting their milt all over when caught.
The crappie, I don't think have went into full spawn. It's like some are some aren't.

Now my question. I have notice that the few we have kept and filleted, the females have the normal yellow egg sac up until last two weekends. They now appear to lost the yellow color and are now tan to brownish sacs with the eggs still intact and have not shrunk in size. Does the color change indicate the spawn is over and the egg sacs are being reabsorbed? Or does that mean the females are now on the verge of the spawn and ready to drop their eggs?
We will be out on our lake both Sat and Sun this weekend. I will be interested to see what has happened to the sacs.

We put thousands of crappie in the boat last year and released most of them keeping some only twice last year. This year we planned on keeping some more and are bringing the ice and cooler bringing home between 10-15 each time.
One more thing. We do our best crappie catching in June/July and August before the numbers start falling as the cooler weather sets in in mid-Sept. 100-225 crappie in a day is the norm after the spawn. We have identified several mid-lake humps where they all gather enmass after the spawn till they start migrating back to the shorelines and shallows in Sept when the water cools.

It was the first week in June in 2021 that the spawn was wrapping up and they started migrating from the shorelines to the mid-lake humps. Looking forward to this weekend to see whether the same pattern applies this year.