Pool 4, Mississippi River

Lower pool 4 backwaters are beginning to fire up now. The crappie bite along stretches of rip rap next to deep, well-currented channel water have been going for 6 weeks but today I finally located crappie of some size back off the channel. I still needed to have deeper water nearby, but the fish were on sunken wood. Smaller fish were tight to the wood while crappies to 13.75 inches were caught outside of the tangle where the water dropped off. Chartreuse jigs with a Chartreuse Shad Gulp 1" minnow took them all.

Sunfish were available but nothing of any real size. 8 inches was about tops. Wingdams on the channel are still showing some gills in the 10 and 11 inch range but they are getting harder to find consistently.

Lows in the 20's are forecast for tonight and the winds are supposed to settle so I look to see water temps begin to drop like a rock in the backwaters areas where depth is shallower. High pressure will settle the fish in deeper holes until we see some moderation in the temps but this late into the fall we might not see that happen until April or May now.