I was fishing a private pond here in Hardin Co yesterday throwing a 1/16th oz chart roadrunner with a white 2" twister tail & caught afew 6"-8" crappies all appeared to be males & 1 big old largemouth how's everybody else doing?
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I was fishing a private pond here in Hardin Co yesterday throwing a 1/16th oz chart roadrunner with a white 2" twister tail & caught afew 6"-8" crappies all appeared to be males & 1 big old largemouth how's everybody else doing?
We caught a nice mess of 12"ers down by Anita last Saturday. Wind finally blew us away, but they were holding at 8' in a brush pile in 13' of water. Very aggressive fish and caught all of them on 2" pearl Gulp Fry and half nightcrawler.
They are spawning here on the east side of IA. Males are up shallow in brush or along chunk rock shorelines, females are just outside them usually within 15-25 feet. The whites appear to be spawned out and the blacks are right in the middle.
5 days of rain and cold slowed them down last week around here, but my wife and her Dad caught a nice mess of 15 jumbo crappies this morning. Bite was inconsistent on purple/white and green/chartreuse fleck tubes and nightcrawlers under slip floats.
Kevin - you fishing spawned out fish on the river around QC or lakes? I know it's been warmer, but still seems pretty early for finishing spawn on larger lakes...river fish I would agree are there. I don't doubt the males are up close but females I question being spawned out.
My post was about the river. I fished spawning crappies in the largest lake we have in the area (LGL) on april 17th. I was watching them spawn in the clear water. Water temps then were 64-66 all over the lake. The river seems to be about a week and a half behind the lakes each year. LGL was 65 when the river was 52.
I kept two gut hooked crappies on 4/29 on the river, one white and one black. The white was a spawned out female, and the black was a nearly spawned out female with just a speck of eggs left. I haven't seen any females with noticeable eggs in almost a week.
Thanks Kevin. From all your posts I know your an experienced angler. I'm the guy that gave you some ice fishing coordinate for Sabula a few years back. The river fish don't seem to rely strictly on water temp to dump their eggs. I'm sure LGL warms up sooner than most since it's crick fed but mostly run off water. I've always felt that the larger river fed lakes seem to take longer to warm.
Ahh! I was trying to remember your username on IS, wanted to invite you down to fish at the end of the season last year when I was on a good bite. I was talking to 3-4 different guys from sabula area last year and couldn't remember who was who.
We don't have any river lakes down here, at least not until you get down to odessa I suppose... as you probably already knew. So I have no experience with those when it comes to crappie spawning. All of my fishing is done on inland lakes and sloughs off of the main river this time of year.
I'll tell you what's really going the last couple weeks is the yellow bass. Never seen anything like it! Usually maybe catch 1 or 2 while crappie fishing this time of year but we have been catching 8-12 a day and ALL of them 11-12.5" long. I think I have seen maybe 3-4 in the typical 8-9" range this year. Its crazy...
I've never been a believer on water temp either, always figured they were more calendar fish around here that spawned about the same time each year... but I was wrong. I found spawning fish early april this year (by spawning I mean milting males sight fished while protecting spots. Last year the ice was barely off the water in early april. I will be confident in saying they will be done spawning here after this weekend. Water temp hit 60 today (4 degree climb in 2 days), it will be back to 65 by sunday. Heck the male largemouth were on beds last weekend. Bluegills should be up shallow next weekend, I got a report of eager males making beds on the north shores last week before the cold front down in the muscatine area.. that's a month early.
Everything seems to be happening very early this year. Mushrooms are already hitting the end of the season in southern Iowa. I have buddies that have been finding big yellows for a week. Usually that doesn't happen until middle 4th season turkey and we find them up to 2 weeks past end of turkey season.. Again almost a month early. Hope we aren't in for a big slow down mid summer!