Unbelievable Crappie catch 2/20/21

I wasn’t going to do anything today with it being Saturday, but my fishing buddy, Phil called and wanted to go ahead of drop the two crappie hotels that I had ready to go. So off we went to open the hotels for business.

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We got them planted in spots that I had designated that should be good summer places.
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Then we decided to scout for a little while and pick out another spot for a hotel that I made yesterday. We will plant it next week. But as we were idling out into the main river channel and about 150 yards into the channel, we passed over a big school of fish with big signatures and I thought that they might be Stripers.

So we broke out our Stripers rods and lures and began to cast for these fish. We were in 37 feet of water and TVA was running 70,000 cfs with surface temp at 44.9 degrees. I had a 5” Zoom Super Salty fluke on a 3/8 oz Shad head jig. Phil was fishing with a 3/8 oz Slab Rap.

It took 29 seconds for the jig to hit the bottom in 37 feet of water, then we began slow rolling the lures back in. When the jig was almost straight down from me, I was dead sticking the bait when I felt a thump and set the hook.
To my great surprise, I landed a 10.5” crappie on that big lure.
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Next cast, Phil landed a crappie of about 6”. Grin. I was greatly surprised because everybody says that crappie don’t like current, but these two fish must not have gotten the memo. 37 feet deep, 70,000 cfs. You just never know where you might find a crappie. Lolol.
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We have our next spot marked for the hotel. It will be opening soon.

DK I told you no matter where it is or the conditions you are gonna catch a crappie! I can’t wait to fish the hotels, get ready for a smack down when I get back out there!

crappie love a big bait at times! WTG

Seems like a Super Fluke shaped hotel oughta be the ticket. lol

Nice looking hotels. You never know what will happen when you cast a line. That does seem like an odd location for crappie - Great job.

A few years back I caught a nice 14 incher on a super fluke while bass fishing brush in the middle of June. It kinda makes ya wonder why I sometimes worry about 3" baits being TOO BIG!!

I like those hotels, our lakes trying to come up a little, rains this next week should help. Catching crappie that deep on that big bait is crazy, they must be awful hungry down there.