I use artificial jigs all of the time when I crappie fish. Just about any plastic and/or color will work at one time or another. In a year's time, I may use floaters 1% of the time. All the rest of the time, I am tight lining jigs. Every crappie fisherman has his own favorite lure that he absolutely tears the fish up with. But my advice is to never fall in love with a favorite lure. It will break your heart like your first girl friend because there are days that the fish want something other than your favorite lure. I'm trying to teach Polo this, but he is a slow learner and fast forgetter. emoPoke JK, Polo knows that I love him and he is one of the best crappie fishermen around.
You could have hundreds of different lures and colors in your tackle box, but you really don't need all that many. I am trying to simplify my own crappie fishing arsenal. This is what I am shooting for as far as tackle goes. Ringer stingers (crappie stingers), Bobby Garland 2" shads and slab slayers, and panfish assassins.
I know that tubes, curly tailed grubs, creature baits, crickets, etc lures all catch crappie and are very good, but I really don't need them. Hair jigs work too, but I use them less that I do floaters and jigs.
Colors: depends upon the time of year and the condition of the water. Early spring/late fall (after turnover) when the water is stained (has a nice green color to it) pearl/chartreuse or red/chartreuse is very good. Really, anything that has chartreuse is good in the spring. When the water turns clear, begin to migrate away from chartreuse/solid colors to the more translucent colors. Crystal shad, salt/pepper, pinks, rainbow, and blue. Summer time is when clear blue colors shine and will until the water is stained again. On cloudy days, use brighter colors and on sunny days, go to the more subtle colors. I almost always experiment with spike-it colors on the very tips of the tails of many of the lures that I toss.
Minnow fishermen will argue that you can't beat minnows for crappie, but this is because they don't know how to fish a jig and can't detect the strike of a crappie. That is why they use visual aids (floaters) to let them know when a fish has taken their bait. I have just offended some fishermen I am sure, but I didn't mean to. If I were a minnow fisherman, I would take it on as a challenge to learn how to catch crappie on jigs. When you learn how, then there will be no more trips to the tackle store to buy minnows, worry about keeping them alive, time between fish to impale another on the jig etc. I have caught as many as 24 crappie on consecutive casts before missing one. Others have caught more than that. Fishing Machine pulled up on a dock a couple of years ago and caught crappie on consecutive casts for over 40 minutes before they quit biting. That is a dream trip of a lifetime for some.
Detecting a crappie bite: I have covered this before many times on the forum, but it doesn't weary me to repeat this to a newcomer. You must be a line watcher at all times. Watch the line like the proverbial hawk. Don't take your eyes off the line for any reason. Most crappie bites are very subtle and you never feel them. When you "feel" the bite, it is usually because the crappie is blowing the jig back out of his mouth and it gets snagged on the lips or corner of the mouth. What you will see when the crappie inhales the jig is either a slight "tic" of the line (a slight little hop or twitch), or you will see the line begin to slowly move off to one side or the other, or you will see the line go slack (and you know that the jig hasn't hit bottom), or you won't know or see anything and the fish will just be on the line when you start to speed up your retrieve to make another cast. I don't know of the times that I have had a fish on and never saw the line do anything. This is especially true if you are fishing in the wind.
When fishing in the wind, I usually look a the "C" in the line that is caused by the wind as it blows hard against it. This is about 5 or 6 feet above the water line. If it begins to straighten out, set the hook. You will never feel a crappie when it bites in a strong wind. All other times, I am watching the line at the point of entry to the water. If you even think that you saw something different, set the hook. It doesn't cost a thing to set the hook. Little "palsy" twitches at various intervals during the retrieve will a lot of times cause a reaction bite from a crappie that is looking at the jig and hasn't decided to eat it yet. You ought to "dead" stick a jig at least 30 seconds near the boat before reeling to to make another cast. Some days that is the only technique that will produce a strike.
You have to experiment each day to find the magic depth, hottest lure, technique, etc. but that is the fun in crappie fishing. Some days I don't catch very many, but most days I don't have any problem easily catching my limit and on good days, 4 or 5 more limits. Release most of your fish. Teach others what you have learned and pretty soon, you will be on your way to becoming a master angler.
Equipment: Use any Hi-Vis line in the 4 lb to 6 lb test. My favorite is Mr Crappie which may be hard to get. Use an open-faced reel that has the widest spoon that you can find. Graphite ul rods in the 4'6" to 5.0 lengths. If the tip is very whippy, break it off down to the next guide, put a new tip on it. I usually buy 5'6" rods and break them to 5.0 or I buy 5.0 and break the tip to about 4'6" or 4'8". Set the drag sort of loose because you never know when you are fishing docks or bluffs that you will run into a big bass, catfish, or drum and you don't want them to break you off. I have caught Rockfish up to 12 lb 8 oz on 4 lb test line. 13.5 lb bluecat, 9.5 channel cat, 18 lb drum, and 4.8 small mouth bass. Sure, I have had big fish break me off when they run around posts on docks, but they were still fun to hook up.
If you have any further questions, or I haven't covered this topic thoroughly enough, ask the ? on this thread and I will expand if possible. I will be checking back on this from time to time for a few days. There are several others on here who are qualified to answer these questions too and please feel free to do so. I want to learn something too. emoTeacher emoBigsmile emoGeezer
