I spent all morning in the surgery waiting room at Baptist Hospital in Paducah waiting to hear from my daughter's surgery. It went well but really put a downer on my day so I came back to the house and hooked up the boat to clear my head. I got on the lake around 4. First time out in 3 weeks.
I started putting my poles out and only had 2-3 out when one of my 14' side poles did a 90% in the holder. Thinking it was hung up, I grabbed it and felt a well-known head shake. It was on from there. Here I am trying to steer the boat with the Terrova remote, hang on to the bent-double Southern Crappie rod,and get the net. After a couple of minutes I could see the fish as it rolled to the top, a channel cat of 12-15 pounds. I already had visions of fillets for a friend of mine's family. I trade him fresh catfish for fresh barnyard eggs. Works great for both of us.
I got the catfish to within 20 feet or so of the transom and had the net in place when it did another roll and POW, it was gone with my custom c55 crankbait. Crappy way to start a trip.
The crappie were very scattered as were the bait balls. I would catch one here, one there but none of them over 12 inches. I had released 4 keepers but kept a couple of nice catfish
I had seen a big, black Ranger in the same vicinity trolling cranks. We were on opposite paths so we didn't get very close initially. After a couple of hours the Ranger pulled up along side me and one of the guys ( I didn't recognize him) asked if I was doing any good. Being a fisherman, I said no, it was tough. I didn't lie. He then asked me what my handle was on Crappie.com (he saw the decals on my boat). I told him mrdux. He said I'm Speck. I had met him last year briefly. He asked if I wanted some fish and I thought my catfish buddy would enjoy some so I said yes. I handed him my Ego net and he put 5 nice keepers into it and handed it back to me. I pulled a couple of new custom c55s cranks out of one of my boxes and told him to try these. I thanked him and his partner then we parted ways and I got back to the cranks.
It was right at sundown and I figured it was over as I headed back to the ramp, dragging 7 cranks. The catfish were enjoying the big c55s but the crappie I had caught were on custom Bandits. I was watching the back rods off the transom and saw a fish hit a black with pink flake Bandit. I grabbed the rod and figured it was a cat or bass because it hadn't come to the top like crappie normally will while being dragged at 1.7mph. I started reeling it in and got it about 1/2 the way in when up it popped and the first thing I saw was a mouth the size of a baseball! HUGE CRAPPIE!!! I slowed down my reeling speed and got the net ready as best I could. I got it to within a foot of the net when it tumbled and was gone. The lake had a pretty good chop from the NE wind and it had hit one of the waves just right. There went the biggest crappie I have hooked in a few years!
Funny thing about losing a crappie at the boat on a crank or longlining is they seem to lay there on top, not sure they are actually free to swim off to fight another day. This fish seemed to be mocking me as it laid on its side before it flipped its tail and disappeared. GONE! There have been times in my past that I might have showed my anger in ways that were less than constructive. I felt nothing but respect for that fish. Zero anger. Sort of like I felt last winter when I had the biggest whitetail buck I have ever seen within 60 yards of me in my stand and couldn't get a shot. Maybe we do mellow out with age?
My daughter is going to be fine so it ended up being a good day.
