Postspawn Crappie Tactics by Lindner's Angling Edge

Video Transcript

Got him.

Nice.

You've seen that didn't you Dan?

Yeah, it's on top.

Your heart is beating me.

Nana.

And it's a good one. You might need a net. There's some good ones here.

Okay, I'll get the net for you, big.

She's a good one. Look at that, huh?

Yes.

You know you got good crops when you got a net.

Oh, look at that. Oh.

Nice.

Whoa.

How's that for a--

Wow.

How's that for a starter? That's a good one, innit? I told Danny, you better have your big boy--

Holy cow.

Big boy boots on today for the crappies we're going for. And I cheated a little bit. I came out here yesterday and I told Dan, I'm catching some really big crappies. Now Dan and I don't get a chance to fish as much as we like to. 'Cause he's always working, he's editing, shooting shows, he's got a young family, he's busy. Although we do get a chance to get out and his favorite fish is a crappie. Just like it is for many of you. Crappie are your favorite fish. And in our part of the world, we're at one of those times where I would consider it a peak period of sorts for these crappies. I'll explain that a little bit as we start catching a few more fish.

That's crappie time, Dano.

 

You know, it seems like every year you keep on saying the same thing. Springs are strange, you know. It's either high water, low water, late season. And that's what it happens to be this year. We're about three weeks behind where we would normally be at this timeframe. And so these weeds have not fully developed. That's where we're at right now. At least in central Minnesota.

We're throwing up into about six. And I'm holding an eight to nine. And the magic depth seems to be somewhere around sevenish. But what the real magic is, is weeds. Weeds, these weed beds are not up the way they should be yet. You know, because of the late season. I mean, it was crazy this year. We're chasing three weeks like we are for any kind of fish.

 

Counted that one down to about four L.

 

You'll notice he's fishing with the float. I'm swimming a jig. And when we start out doing this, fish is coming up.

Didn't need a nut, I'm sure. Oh yeah.

Yep.

They're nettable fish, Dan, out there.

It's always good fish.

Oh yeah. Come on, Mr. Clam.

Oh, can't get it. I can't stretch my arm that far.

There he goes.

Swimming that, swimming that little jig. Look at that beauty, huh? Beautiful, Krabby, thank you, L. Like I said, Al's fishing with a float. And I'm swimming a jig. And when we start out doing this, you'll see a preference on any given day, whether the fish want it swimming or underneath that float. So you always want to have two rods rigged. Yeah, like I was saying, I was testing, whenever you're casting a and swimming a jig back, you're always kind of messing with the countdown method. You'll cast it out there, give it a one, one thousand, two, one thousand, three, one thousand, four. And then slowly swim that bait back off and around and through those weeds. And when you get onto a countdown time, like that one was on for, I'll replicate that. You know what I mean? Rinse and repeat and then I'll up your rods and catch them more fish.

You know what, in what's a big fish in our part of the world, the big crappie? These are a nice eater. This is, you know, right in that eating size. And when you get a 14 inch or above and occasionally 15 inch or we get out of these lakes here, you know, once in a while bigger than that, that's a big upper midwest crappie by a long shot. What's happening here, it's that time of the year that we often refer to as a summer peak for different kinds of fish. And these big fish are out here now. You're seeing a lot of big fish. They are the first size fish, these crappies are the first ones to go in. He's got a crappie there.

 

Wait, see I got that timing down at about five is when you start swimming in back. Oh, holy man, you got one of those.

Moses Malone.

You got a toad.

You got a toad.

I thought it was a bath.

You got a toad though.

I got the countdown.

No!

That'll be my hero.

Oh, that's a...

Look at the size of this. Dude, that is a big, big crappity. Mr. Clam produced. I'll get that hook out of there.

That's a big crappie, believe me.

That is a dandy, holy cow, man. That is a magnum. And like what Al was talking about, in this timeframe right now, a lot of the first fish in, these big ones like this are the first fish in and the first fish out. And you gotta understand what's happening. It's a late season, so these fish don't have a lot of time to deli-dally. They go in, do their business, and they get back out, and these big ones are the first ones out on this weed line, the pivot point. We'll talk more about that in a little bit.

Wow, wee. Bye-bye.

 

These fish just finished spawning just a little while ago. And there's probably still males up in the shallow water. That's why you're seeing all the big fish out here right now. And the whole thing revolves around weeds, weeds, and more weeds. As these weed beds develop on these edges early in the season like this, they're patchy weeds. So you gotta find the weeds that a crappies will gravitate to the weeds on the first initial drop off. Some lakes, dark water lakes, that could be a four foot edge, and another lake, it might be a six or eight foot edge, like it is on the lake that we're on, some crystal clear lakes that might be 10, 12 feet. But wherever the weeds start to develop, those crappies will go there. As the season goes on, those weeds can get so thick that you can hardly penetrate it. Those crappies will live in there, and they don't come out until late evening, they come to the edge or come above the weeds in the evening. But this time of the year, when you find them like this, it's one of those magic moments, you get about two weeks that is special, fantastic weed line crappie fishing, before they start getting hard to get out, they penetrate pretty good. Right now you can get a bait out in front of their face.

You know, and Elle's talking about those sparse weed clumps that are out right now, and that's where your electronics can be very advantageous, especially side imaging at this timeframe, 'cause if you look down this break to that break, there could be clumps of weeds here, there, 100 yard spread, and for you to fish this whole thing with a float and swim in a jig like that and take you year in a day, so what we do a lot is drive along with our using our side imaging on the hummingbird, and you find those clumps of weeds, at least it gives you a starting point, where those clumps of weeds are at and likely the fish, you know, so it'll expedite your fish catching process by using side imaging to your advantage.

 

Like we said earlier, we started off, each guy has got a float rod and a swim jig rod. Right now he's doing better than I am on that swim jig, but I'm catching some on a float, and it's interesting to see it. If we're all fishing floats, and nobody was swimming down a little bit deeper and tickling the top of those weeds, you might say that the fish ain't biting real good today, and he's kicking my butt, I'm coming through with the float first, you know, and I'm getting some nice fish, but he's getting more behind me. So it gives you an idea, you watch what's happening, you always let the fish tell you what they're doing, and nothing is better than doing a little bit of an experiment, one thing we'd almost never do is both guys and above, both fish the exact same bait, at the exact same depth doing the exact same thing, at any given time, we're always mixing it up, mixing it up, mixing it up, and at the end, one guy, it might be a 60/40 to the float to the swim jig, but that other percentage of fish you would've never got. You would've never got 'em, if you didn't change up, got 'em, got 'em.

 

Oh, I'm going right back into the sweet spot there.

 

I moved the tuck, it's--

Oh, look at that side, look at the thicc, right in that same spot right there.

I got the sweet spot, Dan, I'm picking up quick with the quirk. (laughs)

Whoa.

They're not a giant. I am getting a little bit spoiled when I'm saying not a giant, ooh, I flipped down and I shouldn't have. It was bigger than I thought. Any broke my jig off. Look at that. That's what I get for trying to flip a fish like this.

Yeah, you should show them that jig.

I gotta tell you a little bit about this jig that I'm using. You know, we do a lot of work, one of our soft bait partners is Big Bite Bates. They're one of the biggest manufacturer of soft plastic baits in whole wide world. And they always ask us, give us an idea of some new designs for Dippert for Smallmouth for a large mouth and, and I said, what about panfish? And everybody at panfish is a big business. I said, I got a bait I'd like you to consider. And I want you to look at this bait. There's been baits similar to this on a market for a lot of years. Maribou tail, lead head, rounded body. There's been a few manufacturers that made a bait like this, but they never made it this small. I catch a lot of fish on a bait like this. I says, give me a shape of a head, which they did. I wanted to guide the tie on hook to be designed to be fish vertical under a float along with casting. But I want to be able to vertical jig it. And the body is round and that Maribou teaser tail is there. And this baby, they did this right. They came out with it. You know what they named it? They named it Lenders Panfish jig. Hi, I love you. Thank you. Lenders Panfish jig. I love it. And it is one fish catching sucker. The line we're using is floral carbon. It's four pound tests, suffix floral carbon liters. And we've got nano braid for backup. I have one rod that is all mono with a floral carbon liter. And four pound test is what you need to do. I think one of the biggest mistakes we ever see people make croppy fishermen and pan fishermen in general is fishing too heavy a line, too heavy of a bait. You always want to remember in pan fishing smaller and lighter is better. That holds true day in and day out. Anywhere you go, people love to catch crappies. You know, they've really become popular up in Canada, too. It's amazing, Dan, to see how the population has exploded up in Canada. Used to go up there to think, wall-eye, wall-eye, wall-eye. Then it went, small-mouth, small-mouth, small-mouth. Now they're going crappie, crappie, crappie, you know what I tell us, tell people to come up here and fish our great crappie fishing experiences. Whoop, he had another one. You got yours, too? Yep. (jazzy music)