The different ways to fish for crappie - for the new guys & girls just learning

I was asked to add this to the sticky section to help the new guys and girls that are just beginning to learn how to catch crappie. I hope this thread will help all that choose to chase the never ending quest to find, catch and enjoy the reaps of your time on the waters.

You will here different setups called different names. To make is easy for you it goes like this & I hope this will help you.

1. tight lining (spider rigging) mostly fished from the front of the boat. long rods used and 1/4 oz up weights to keep the lines vertical and fished at a slow speed. This is the way to fish when you want to control jig depth. When the fish are on big flats this is a great way to troll around the flat. Speeds will run from almost stopped up to 1.5 mph

2. Longlining, rods used out the back of the boat with the boat never stopping(most of the time but can be done from front also) you use different length rods to spread out the lines behind the boat. You can use jigs of all sizes but most will pull 1/16 oz jigs. You control the depth of your jigs by the speed of your boat. You have to speed time on flats to see how the jigs run and need to take notes of 1. amount of line out 2. size jighead + type of jigs used 3. speed of the boat. the way to learn this is to pull on different depth flats from 4' deep to 10' deep. Put the lines out the back while running at a fast speed and slow down until your jigs start to hit the bottom, make notes of your speed and the depth of the flat. If it is a 4' flat you now know how to get your jigs down to 4'. Do this on a few flats and you will have a very good starting point.

3. night stalking, anchored fishing with tight lines with light weights.

4. dock shooting, shooting jigs under docks to reach the fish in the shades of the docks or boats.

5. Jigging, using a long rod with a jig dropping down beside any and everything in the water that may be holding crappie

6. single rod fishing. Old style of throwing out a jig or minnow with or without a float.

This covers most of the ways we fish for crappie.
Other crappie fisherman please add a method you use if not listed or some information on how you may fish for crappie.

Thanks, Stump