Winter help

Growing up on truman, we had a couple of spots we fished in the cold but all in all, we didnt winter crappie fish much
Now, I'm fishing the jackson county lakes and Smithville a lot. This past saturday on Longview, I was able to find a lot of fish on the side scan, and then get over them with the di. They were holding about 16-20 feet down, in 30-40 feet of water. We were just drifting at .2mph with the wind and we managed to catch 6-8 dink crappie, and 3 big white bass. If we stayed in one spot with the trolling motor, we couldn't get bit. Double jigs and most fish were caught on black/chartreuse. What could we have done differently? Why we we only catching drinks, when there are plenty of good fish in that lake? Thanks for any and all thoughts.

All I can tell you is with the livescope you would be amazed at how many fish swim right to your jig and swim away. Tons of follows. Holding the jig very still helps for me , they do not seem to want it moving except to slightly raise it about their head very slowly, that seems to trigger a strike sometimes.

All that being said have not done very well so far this winter. Good Luck.

:hesaid

Personally, I think live bait will reduce the number of disinterested fish and perhaps put more in the boat. But I haven't confirmed that yet.

All I know is that last month when I took that whole week off and fished four or five times, jigs didn't do squat and I caught limits with double minnow rigs over a dropshot.

keeperfish said it well and what I find too. They won't chase much some days and you just have to spoon feed them. Little fish will always be the catch unless the big girls are hunting. Small fish are generally more aggressive unless they have any larger competition. Trolling motors can really slow the catch rate for sure.

Joedog is right on. someday's minnows are the ticket while others jigs will produce just fine. is why guides always carry both and start off with live bait as they get paid to put fish in the boat.

somedays jig has to be moving to trigger and others they want it dead still. that's fishing.

Better fishing at Jacomo and Blue Springs for winter crappie. Put the jigs down and use a pepper spoon.

Up here in the Nort I find cold water period smaller size and days when hair jigs just work kept dead still as little movement as possible. Have to let the fish tell you what they want some movement dead still or a lot of action. Up here it seems the smaller 7-9 inch fish do not hang much with the 10 and over but that is not wrote in stone either. I believe in my opinion is most of our bigger fish are out over open water not much cover and I think the smaller fish do not feel real comfortable with out cover being around.