Shellcrackers and a TARP Black crappie 5/15/19

[drumking]

Wanda put me in the water at Tyner Lane ramp around 9:30 and I had a crappie condo loaded in my boat to plant in the lake. Cuonthelake was supposed to meet me around 11:30-12 ish, but she got too busy and texted me that she wasn’t going to come. So, I did a solo trip today and it was a great day.

I started off on a shellcracker bed and had 3-4 keepers in the livewell when the largest bass that I have hooked up sucked in the Itty Bitty Slab Slayer and went airborne when it realized that I was on the other end of the line. It made a 30-40 yard screaming run before reversing fields and ran back toward the boat. I wasn’t worried because I had 300 yards of 2 lb test line on. I knew it would take a miracle to land this fish. After 45-60 seconds of fight, it went airborne again and this time the little jig came flying. I conservatively estimate this bass 8 lbs or better.

I kept 12 nice sized crackers and released another 15 or so and when it clouded up at 11, the crackers quit biting and I thought about crappie fishing,

I ran to my first spot and the crappie were on fire. I was fishing the main river even though TVA was running 77,000 cfs. I found an eddy current and caught a 13.25” crappie on first cast. I landed 9 crappie there, including a 14.25” tarp Black crappie which I released. I kept 6 out of the 9 fish for the freezer. Rain drops started at 12:52 and the batteries on my remote finally gave out after a year, and I didn’t have a screwdriver in the boat to take the back off and replace the batteries. So, I called Wanda and asked her to meet me at Tyner Lane with the boat trailer.

72 degrees was the surface temp and I’ll included pics of the lures I used today.