2/15/13 on Kentucky Lake's North End

Fished four hours this afternoon in cold and blustery wind, spiderrigging. Thank goodness for a good drift sock. Ended up with 15 nice crappie, 4 of which were black. Had twice that many bites, but missed lots of fish. Guess I'll blame it on the wind...but it might be the fisherman. All these fish came on Panfish Assassins in the Electric Chicken color tipped with minnows. I normally use Bobby Garland's electric chicken, but the darker/brighter green on the little assassins seemed to work better today.

Last year in the area I've fished the last four trips I caught tons of short fish. This year in four trips I've yet to catch a fish less than 10 1/2 inches in length. Now, that's good news!

Good Job how for north in kentucky?

It seems those little boogers must have grown up. Last year when I was down there for our annual spring trip we caught more short fish than we'd caught in the previous 10 years combined.

We slayed the short fish last year too. Bunches of them 1/4 to 1/2 shy of being legal. Future is bright for that fishery. Sad to say I don't think we will be going back this year at least in the Spring. Work obligations for my fishing partner.

I haven't caught many short fish either but I'm not sure that's a good thing for 4 or 5 yr down the road.

Well said whiskers. I get worried when I don't catch throw backs. THESE ARE THE FISH OF FUTURE TRIPS.

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Originally Posted by Wiskers

I haven't caught many short fish either but I'm not sure that's a good thing for 4 or 5 yr down the road.

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I know what you are saying about the short fish but Ky Lake always seemed funny to me. In all the years we've been coming down there (I don't know exactly, maybe 15) we've always caught mostly 10" plus, most years we don't even keep 10" fish but start @ 11" and at the end of our 4 days we would have only come across a dozen or 2 under 10". I used to wonder where are the small guys were hiding? Last year we had probably had 80% short fish, I thought where's the good'uns?

Up here it's different, you can catch a hundred short fish a day with only a handful over 10".

I've caught several short whites this year, granted not anything like a year and a half ago, but still decent numbers of them. I'm personally not worried about it for the next couple years, atleast from what I've seen to this point. Did Paul post a link yet with the results from this past fall's trap survey analysis?

This is just a thought but I always seem to catch more short fish in the fall than spring. If recent studies by KDFWR are correct there is a good reason. The crappie fry from March and April of last year are this years 10 inch plus fish. According to Paul Rister, Fisheries Biologist, recent studies show an amazing growth rate on Kentucky Lake. Fry from last years hatch will be this years 10 inch fish. Some might be 9 3/4 which I seem to find often in the spring. Some will be the 10 1/4 that are swimming in Lake Crisco tonight. Individual growth rates likely vary by fish, available food, birth date, etc. But we see a ton of fish in the spring in that 9.5-10.5 range which are likely last years young. That also explains why a person might find more short fish in the fall than spring. A few crappie spawn late, say June to August, giving us some 5-10 inch fish come spring but the numbers will be much lower than you could see in the fall. So the answer seems to be the reason we don't catch as many short fish in the spring is there simply isn't as many. The babies from last year have grown up. The fertility of Kentucky and Barkley are truly amazing and we are lucky to have them and the KDFWR that care.

I'd have to agree with pab.
I've had numerous days this winter with lots of short fish. They definitely are not as plentiful as 2 years ago but I've been satisfied with what I've seen. The fish have mainly been of the white species also.

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Originally Posted by kytiteloc

I'd have to agree with pab.
I've had numerous days this winter with lots of short fish. They definitely are not as plentiful as 2 years ago but I've been satisfied with what I've seen. The fish have mainly been of the white species also.

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I think the way we fish we run into more short fish than the guys driftin/trolling/riggin because we spend more time around the cover they hide in.

I agree again!!
The little fry need cover to survive from prey & to access easier meals.
Good quality man made beds = good quality fishery!!

Although its nice to see all the good 10+ inch fish, it would be good to see better numbers of short fish. On average it takes crappie about 3 years to reach 10 inches, so all those 9 3/4 inch fish we saw last spring came from a really good spawn 3 years earlier. I suspect last years low water likely didn't produce a very good crappie spawn, lets hope for better conditions this year. Our spawn this year will determine what kind of crappie numbers we have available 3 and 4 years from now.

Hey Blade Runner,

Not arguing with you because until recently I would have agreed with you thinking the same. But according to Paul Rister with KDFWR, sampling of crappie done last fall and studying done over the winter show that our crappie are reaching 10 inches in 1 year! I was amazed! Who would have believed it but they sampled crappie looking for those they have planted in the lake and found that fry from last year are this years ten inch fish. They think part of that fast growth rate may have to something to do with a lack of bigger fish competing for food. So actually according to the biologists we have a shortage of big rather than short fish. And the 9 3/4 inch fish we will catch this spring are just a year old. I normally catch more undersized fish in the fall. Fish that are 5 to 9 inches. And that makes sense because those are fish of the past spring. So if KDFWR is correct, the spawn of this year will determine the keeper fish we see through next year. Those that survive next year will be the 13 plus inch fish we see in two years. Like I said it is amazing to think the lake is that fertile. In fact I will add what Paul posted awhile back so people can review it. It is interesting. I have underlined the portion regarding crappie reaching the 10 inch limit in one year.

The results from our fall one-day tournament are in. Thanks to the 15 crappie anglers that participated. A total of 123 white crappie were harvested for our study, plus additional black crappie that we were not really interested in.

Again, we have been stocking white crappie in Blood River since 2009. The white crappie were mark prior to stocking by being submersed in a chemical call OTC. This chemical causes a fluorescent band to be laid down on the crappie otoliths. To make a long story very short.

Typically it takes crappie 3 years to reach 10 inches. Therefore the 2009 stocked crappie should all be at least 10 inches long.

For the tournament we held during this past fall, anglers brought their crappie in from a day of fishing, we measured the crappie and removed their otoliths. Back in the lab the otoliths were examined under a special lighted microscope. The delay in getting the results back for this study is that the "special" light on the micro burned out and had to be ordered, which was back ordered.. Anyway... Of the 123 white crappie harvested by the anglers, 2 were age 5 (2007 year class), 4 were age 4 (2008 year class). These years crappie had not been stocked. There were 5 age-3 crappie (2009 year class), which was the first year we stocked crappie. We stocked 38,600 in Blood River in 2009. Of these crappie, no marked (stocked fish) were detected based on marked otoliths. However, there were 106 age-2 white crappie that where harvested (yes, they were a least 10 inches in length). These fish would be from the 2010 year class, the second year of stocking. In 2010 we stocked 70,000 fingerling white crappie in Blood River. Of these crappie in the 2010 year class, 5 were marked. Then surprisingly, there were 6 age-1 white crappie that were harvest during this tournament. I say surprisingly, because of the exceptional growth, to reach 10 inches by age 1. However, exceptionally faster growth in fish can be expected when the numbers of adult fish is lower. This is the case, since we have had some poor year classes. The number of adult crappie has been down, hence the reason we were stocking fish in the first place. Anyway, of the age 1 crappie, no marked fish were detected. In 2011 we stocked 177,695 white crappie in Blood River.

So over all, of the crappie harvested that were of age to be from a year (2009-2011) that we stocked crappie, there were 117 white crappie harvested with 5 of them being stocked. This (117 white crappie) is almost 6 limits of fish (20 crappie per limit). The percentage of stocked crappie would be roughly 4% in this study. I make this point, to bring up the discussion with anglers that occurred during our public meeting regarding crappie stocking. During the meeting we had with anglers at Miss Scarlet’s Restaurant on February 17, 2009, we informed the anglers that the stocking project could cost as much as $0.50 per stocked fish. We went on to tell the anglers our first stocking could be around 60,000 fingerlings (30,000 for KY and 30,000 for Barkley). We asked the anglers to write a number on a piece of paper that should represent the number of stocked fish they would like to see in their daily creel limit to justify the annual cost of this project. The average number reported by all anglers present was 4, or 20% of their daily creel limit.

So using the data from this recent study where anglers provided us with the white crappie, 123 fish were harvest for our one day tournament we had this past fall. That is roughly 6 limits of crappie. Only 5 (4.0%) of the harvested crappie were stocked fish. Therefore, according the anglers bench mark (20%), we did not meet their expectations.
Even if you exclude the age 4 and 5 year old crappie, which were not from years we stocked crappie, the percentage only increases to 4.3%.

We still plan to stock crappie one more year (2013). The three year project turned into a five year project. We will again have another tournament with anglers this fall, to once again assess the number of stocked crappie in the population.

Despite our stocking efforts, we observed good numbers of crappie from the 2009 and 2010 year classes. This information is based on our annual fall trap netting. This netting has been done for the past 26 years to assess the crappie population in both KY and Barkley lakes. We know that this rebound in crappie is due to natural reproduction and not stocking, because crappie numbers actually look better in Jonathan Creek than Blood River.

Any questions, email me at [email protected].

I'm sure growth rates vary somewhat every year and they did catch a few fish this fall (6 of 123 or less than 5%) that were age-1 fish over 10 inches, but I still believe its safe to assume the vast majority of all keeper white crappie (10 inch or greater) we catch in the spring are age-2 or age-3+ fish. As Mr. Rister indicated these are just the more typical observed crappie growth rates. Thats not to say in some years on some waters you might not have a few 10 inch age-1 fish, especially in the fall, but thats the exception rather than the rule.

Regardless of differences in growth rates one thing I can tell from experience is we are much better off now than we were prior to 1991. The best thing done was place a ten inch size limit (30 down from 60 and eventually 20 creel) on the lakes. At the time I wondered if Fish and Wildlife was correct but the extreme swings that we used to see in the crappie population seem much more balanced now. I have faith in the KDFWR to do the best thing for fishing. The worst problem I see is water levels during the spawn. But there isn't much we can do about that I guess. I do think guys are too quick sometimes to say the fishing is going to suffer because they have went out a few times and didn't catch any short fish. The lakes are so vast that it is like saying there's no copperheads in the woods because I have been walking to the outhouse and ain't stepped on one. LOL!!! After guiding for many years I have had days where I wish I could find a keeper and quit cathing all those dang short fish. Then the next day hit the same spots and catch all keepers. Fall in a well and her eyes go crossed, kicked in the head by a mule and they straighten out! I don't know....:Rofl