Ready for the spawn

With the water temperature rising it’s getting closer for the crappie spawn.
How many of you catch and release during this time? I am a catch and release fishermen more so during the spawn. This is not to create arguments on here just a little thoughts on my views and your opinions. When keeping fish full of eggs this time of year is at least five crappie that would be added to future fishing if released per fish. Not all hatched eggs will make it but out of hundreds of eggs per fish at least 5 will survive and grow for future fish. I would at least try to turn a few spawning fish back to the lake for future fishing and growth. And I wish they would change the lake keeper size to at least 10inch. Let’s here your thoughts my friends.


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By now I usually have enough fish froze so what I keep is just enough for me, the wife, Dad, and his wife...…..which is usually @ 15 fish. Even though I'll fish for several hours I almost always let the rest live to bite another day.;)

I release 99% of my fish year round. I grew up striper fishing in the early 80's and filling coolers till they wouldn't close every weekend. It didn't take long to get tired of cleaning fish and eating fish. I usually release all crappie unless someone with me wants them. I always release stripers unless I have one that is badly gill hooked or one in the summer that came from too deep to shoot back down. If I get one of those I call my wife and tell her to clear the menu for fish tacos that night. I never freeze fish anymore. Just personal preference.

I'll let a few go back especially the big ole girls. But I usually don't keep any fish anymore. Miss Laura gets most of all our fish. She feeds a lot of people in her neighbor hood with what she gets! I agree that most big fish need to go back. I will never mount a big fish unless it's a 6 pound crappie! :yikes :highfive

Thanks for the feedback everyone. Nice to know that people are releasing some fish back into Wylie


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It is day by day for me whether I keep a bunch or not. I will say for the past 2 years I have stuck with a 10" personal goal and it really does pay off. I wish it was the new law honestly. There's never a need to keep a little 8"er


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If nobody wants em I put em all back. When I need some just go catch em. But the limit is 20 per person and 8 inches on Wylie. If they stay in the law I got no problem. If they run in and dump a limit and go back out. That is a problem. Just my :twocents

I never freeze fish anymore. They go pretty directly onto ice and in the oven or back in the water.

I'm probably differently than the majority here. And, I KNOW I'm different than most of my fellow tournament fishermen, but for me, I keep what I catch 95% of the time. What I don't eat or freeze, I give to folks that aren't able to fish or donate to large cookings (church frys mainly). With that said, I don't fish every day. If I catch a big female she's treated the same as a small female or a buck. To me, it makes no difference in time of year. I've never really understood the "turn em back in the spawn" mentality. A female is an egg producer 12 months out the year. Whether she's blowed up with eggs in March or she's flat as a flitter in August it's still removing an egg producer from the body of water no matter when she's kept. Maybe she wouldn't make it to the next spawn from the summer or fall before, but maybe she would. Granted, I don't believe in folks that fish every single day keeping everything, but I believe a weekend warrior can keep what they wish within reason.

As far as size, I'm not a fan of any size limit on any fish to be honest (especially a STRIPED bass on Murray). I believe in a creel limit. I would not be opposed to a 15 per person limit, but I don't care what size someone chooses to keep. I personally don't want anything under 8" but my absolute favorite fish to eat is a 8-10" crappie scaled and fried whole. 10" is alright, but the 8-9" are the best IMO. I will agree that the harvested year class of fish, on average, has increased in size on most lakes since the implementation of the 8" rule and I see no reason to do away with that, but I'm not a proponent of a 10" law. In fact, from my understanding the 10" limit was discussed as a possibility when the 8" law was introduced and the biologist recommended against it based on the fact that, from their studies, a 10" law would cut the time an anglers had to harvest a legal fish. I believe from what I read was that it would take a crappie 4 years to reach 10" and the average life span of a black crappie was 6 years. Going to 10" would cut the harvest period by 1/3. Not sure how true any of that is, but food for thought none the less.


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Originally Posted by Crappie Buster

I'm probably differently than the majority here. And, I KNOW I'm different than most of my fellow tournament fishermen, but for me, I keep what I catch 95% of the time. What I don't eat or freeze, I give to folks that aren't able to fish or donate to large cookings (church frys mainly). With that said, I don't fish every day. If I catch a big female she's treated the same as a small female or a buck. To me, it makes no difference in time of year. I've never really understood the "turn em back in the spawn" mentality. A female is an egg producer 12 months out the year. Whether she's blowed up with eggs in March or she's flat as a flitter in August it's still removing an egg producer from the body of water no matter when she's kept. Maybe she wouldn't make it to the next spawn from the summer or fall before, but maybe she would. Granted, I don't believe in folks that fish every single day keeping everything, but I believe a weekend warrior can keep what they wish within reason.

As far as size, I'm not a fan of any size limit on any fish to be honest (especially a STRIPED bass on Murray). I believe in a creel limit. I would not be opposed to a 15 per person limit, but I don't care what size someone chooses to keep. I personally don't want anything under 8" but my absolute favorite fish to eat is a 8-10" crappie scaled and fried whole. 10" is alright, but the 8-9" are the best IMO. I will agree that the harvested year class of fish, on average, has increased in size on most lakes since the implementation of the 8" rule and I see no reason to do away with that, but I'm not a proponent of a 10" law. In fact, from my understanding the 10" limit was discussed as a possibility when the 8" law was introduced and the biologist recommended against it based on the fact that, from their studies, a 10" law would cut the time an anglers had to harvest a legal fish. I believe from what I read was that it would take a crappie 4 years to reach 10" and the average life span of a black crappie was 6 years. Going to 10" would cut the harvest period by 1/3. Not sure how true any of that is, but food for thought none the less.


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Crappie are definitely capable of reproducing in large numbers without a lot of large females. Population is controlled by creel limits not size restrictions the size limit is just to have more large fish in my opinion.

My decisions to release fish is based on my personal consumption habits not on the biology. It's up to the biologist to prevent over harvesting not us.

Nice post by the way.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by wolfhnd

Crappie are definitely capable of reproducing in large numbers without a lot of large females. Population is controlled by creel limits not size restrictions the size limit is just to have more large fish in my opinion.

My decisions to release fish is based on my personal consumption habits not on the biology. It's up to the biologist to prevent over harvesting not us.

Nice post by the way.

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I believe there should be a change in the size limits and how many we can keep, as fishermen with or without biologist we should want to have better control on harvesting. This is one of those topics we all have to agree to disagree on. Thanks for all the feedback everyone.


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I have made some fisherman weak at the knees at the ramps turning big crappie back. I just wanted pics of them. I was just having this conversation yesterday with a friend on CDC. The fish 3/4 pound to a pound and a half are the best eating fish I think. With just two in our house I don’t keep many fish anymore but I know many fish for the table and nothing wrong with that. We as crappie fisherman should always be conservatives when we can because lakes can be hit to hard and the crappie fishing can really be bad for years. Greenwood and Secession are two of the lakes that have gone through this. Every fish in the lake feed on crappie, their eggs and fingerling. I think with the 8” size limit has saved these two lakes Bigtime.


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Nobody I hope is going to say lakes can't be over fished. All I'm saying is I'm happy to let the biologists decide how they will be managed. I don't necessarily like every decision they make because they they manage for the average. With public lakes the tragedy of the commons is always going to be a problem. It's why I'm also not a big fan of direct democracy.

If I was managing a lake for crappie I would probably have a slot limit with low creel limits for fish over 11 inches. Of course that only applies to the typical lake in my area where there are lots of little fish. I'm thinking of a creel system of say 15 fish under 10 and 5 over 12. There may also need to be different regulations for black and white Crappie as well as yearly changes. The problem is people don't want to deal with anything that complicated and the enforcement people don't want to turn honest mistakes into violations.

I love to feel the THUMP. I like to see them swim away as I release them too. Especially the big females.

Personally, with it just being my wife and I, I throw a lot of fish back. If I'm catching for just us I only keep around 7-8. If I take a buddy, I'll let them take all the fish with them, but try to encourage releasing females once we catch 10-12.
As far as size of fish to release, I feel its a bit of a wash. The average crappie lives 7-8 years and it takes around 5 years for a crappie to get to 12+". In return an 8" fish is usually around 2 years old. If you toss a 12+" female back she may only have 2 years left to lay eggs and she can carry more eggs. But the 8" female could have 5-6 years left for laying.
For the regulatory side of it. I'd like to see the size bumped up to 9-10" to help with the age structure in the lakes. I would also like to see the limit drop by 5 fish for sustaining the resource. Just my :twocents

There are just so many days a week we can eat fish.
I give fillets to family members and we eat them all year long but caught up on cleaning fish right now and today was another good day on water and all fish caught were released.
I'll be glad when the crappie are spawned out.




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