Thread: Sardis Meeting Summary

It goes on every where MO. Try duck hunting around Stuttgart AR being from out of state. You have no right to shoot THEIR ducks. They love your money, but some will still slash an out of state tire in the parking lot.

Thanks for the report Stan. I appreciate it alot.

Out of staters put only a little dent in the population. Yeh, they do take alot of fish but no where near what in staters do.

I've put alot of thoughts into fish populations on lakes, and trollers and crank baiters do hurt a lake over all. Single polers, well, there aren't many of them left. Most folks these days have trolling racks for spider rigging, not just one pole, one jig anymore.

Websites? I hate to say it but they do hurt lakes. Used to be that if they were biting on a certain lake, you'd have to call around and tell folks about it so the word was slow to spread. Now it spreads so much faster when the bite is on and alot more fish are taken.
Crappie do reproduce at a rapid rate, I will give them suckers that but between fishermen and natural predators, most don't last long.
Last year when they all those big fish were caught on Sardis, how many boats were out there almost every day on average? what, 40-50. Some days just 15-20 but the reports I was hearing was it was slam packed with boats and everyone catching alot of fish.
What about last fall when Butla was so low and people were piling onto the lake and wearing them out. You don't think that's going to hurt the lake? If you take 5 or 6 thousand fish out of a lake, that's 5-6 thousand fish that won't be able to spawn.
Less spawners means less fish in the future. That can't be good for any lake.
I love to fish as much as anyone else but there's only so many fish you can eat. Why would someone go almost every day fishing and keep all they catch? Keep enough for a meal or 2 and throw the rest back.

Just my opinion and which makes alot of sense when you truly think about it

Originally Posted by Speck

It goes on every where MO. Try duck hunting around Stuttgart AR being from out of state. You have no right to shoot THEIR ducks. They love your money, but some will still slash an out of state tire in the parking lot.

Based on what I heard last night and at earlier meetings, I can see this type of behavior spreading towards anyone with a trolling rack on their boat if the fishing conditions worsen dramatically but I don't ever remember hearing a troller bad mouthing jiggers for catching all the fish out of a stake bead or tree top.

And the bad part of that is, no matter the method, I bet there are a lot more people in state that catch over the limit or fish the lake daily and take off limit after limit of fish. I mean, as long as you abide by the rules, what can somebody say? But at what point is it too much? I know some folks that will keep 10-15 fish a trip, and others that will fill up every cooler they have on the boat. Does it all equal out? Is the answer stronger enforcement of laws? So many what ifs come up, but in the grand scheme of things, I think I would be happy with 15 10-12" fish if they were going to be eaten. breeding stock is not hurt. Maybe the water issue is were they should look, or more cover for the small first year fish?

A limit is a limit no matter how you catch them!!! Only keeping 15 will help population if enforced.

Originally Posted by dhdr24

Okay, I am a single pole jig person and I think the most negative comments from guys like me is that in the past people with pontoons would have lots of people on their boats and they were taking way too many fish out for the number of people actually fishing. Honestly, there is too much pressure on all of these lakes with little to be done about that. Crappie.Com has made all of these lakes more appealing to those who live out of state. The fish population can't sustain the amount of pressure that is being put on the Big 4. We all know that something has got to give which means we will all have to give and take. I am glad we are at least having someone to watch out for these lakes because honestly, I felt like we woluld have a good year this year since we caught so many short fish last year, but the pressure has not let off since the spawn. You can go to Sardis on any given day, low water level or not and boat after boat will be putting in Crappie Fishing. The single jig pole folks basically have the pre-spawn, spawn and post spawn to fish which is normally Feb-end of April maybe May on a normal year. You would make many people like me happy if they would do anything to protect that time of the year and make sure we have a decent fish population to have a shot at.

I just wish we could all see ourselves as crappie fishermen, not single polers vs. trollers, I personally enjoy fishing both ways equally well. We all really want the best fishery we can have, and everyone is aware that fishing pressure is increasing, good news travels faster now when they are biting due to cell phones and the internet. GPS, Navionics and SI are making the learning curve much easier for people to get good at finding fish, etc... The biologists are aware of all of these things and they are trying to set the regs accordingly.

I also think you are underestimating the window for single pole fishing. You are right, the time around the spawn is good for shallow fish, but there is another great window for that in the fall, not just springtime. Also, if you are willing to go a little deeper in the summer and winter, you can catch them on a single pole all year long. Right now you could go out there with a jigging spoon or a KY lake rig w jigs and minnows and find fish on the channel edges, there should actually be a decent single pole bite out in the trees by holiday lodge if the water isn't too muddy right now - and that is fishing visible cover, you don't even need a GPS to do that. And BTW, when that water level is right in the spring, on the years that it happens, the amount of fish that get jerked out of there on a single pole is unbelievable - there may be guys trolling all year but you can't deny that, you'll see 100 trucks launching at a place where there isn't even a real ramp

Bottom line, with a 12" limit, I don't think you can overfish these lakes, no matter how many people come to fish or how they choose to catch their fish. With a 10" / 15 fish / 40 per boat total, I don't think you can burn it out that way either. The 40 per boat would solve the issue you mentioned about the big pontoon boats and maybe relieve some guide pressure where there are 3 or more in the boat.

The real reason there were so many shorts last year had more to do with a bad spawn for that year class than it did with fishing pressure or anything the biologists did. Anyone who fished Sardis much last year would agree, you would basically catch an obvious keeper or an obvious short fish, and not much in-between that, there was just a missing year class - caused by a poor spawning season for those fish, probably a low water year or something if you looked back at the records. As fishermen, we have a tendency to base everything off of just our own personal experience, but the biologists are working hard and compiling data long-term to manage the lakes and they can generally predict where those types of age gaps will occur based on their data and they will adjust the regs as needed or at least help us to understand why we are or aren't seeing what we want to see in or cooler at the end of the day.


I think we all have a lot more in common than we realize, I hardly remember ever meeting anyone at the lake over the years I couldn't get along with, and that includes a good number of Yankees along with the in-staters as well I think Sardis is going to be fine.

You wanna so overfished? Come to barnett. They never check your fish and way to many folks go over the limt. During the spawn, I know alot of folks, catch their limit, then go eat lunch and go back form another limit. YES, I do have the wardens number in my phone and do call him from time to time when I see folks doing wrong. I did help stop the striper folks down below the spillway. There were a few down there catching their limit and then having people pick them up, then catch more. Seems they were selling them to Chinese restaurants where they'd pickle them to make immitation crab meat some how or the other

From a out of state troller i got the idea to fish sardis and granda from crappie usa not cdc. they (cusa)have granada and sardis listed #1 and 2 crappie lake in the usa on their website.Yes i did ask a few questions on this board and hired feelay for a day of learning and fishing. im not driving over 500 miles for a limit of 10" fish i can do that here in indiana And im not worried about the numbers of fish i can catch again i can do that here at home. i just want to learn how to fish a new lake and catch some quailty fish and enjoying time with my family and maybe make a few new freinds. Ihave no issue with this rule. If i wanted numbers i wouldnt fish a place with a 15 10" limit