Went fishing today

[Nimrod]

I went fishing today because I have not been in a while and I wanted to see how well the 4 horse works as a kicker on the big boat. I dinked around trolling with the 4 horse for a couple hours, It worked well and I had a few bites. Then I tried a secret spot (shhh). I was graphing fish so I used my slip bobber to get a large crappie minnow down about 8 feet. I caught 4 nice 13 inch crappies. I quit then because I had enough for 4 dinners and I was starting to turn pink, even though I had a tan from working outside. This is a small lake that gets a lot of pressure. I don't want to take very many of the crappies because I don't want to deplete the resource. They don't get fished hard because it seems no one else knows they are that nice.

The secret spot is a rise in the lake bed that is about 11 feet in an area of 16 foot depth. The rise is about as big as your dining room table. Local lore is that the loggers in the late 1800s were trying to get a steam engine out of the woods by putting it on a truck and driving it across the ice in winter. They broke through and it is still there today. I have not lowered a magnet to see if the steam engine is the secret spot or not. It's almost more fun not knowing.

[big rockpile]

Crappie have a way of taking over Small lakes.We almost had a 75 acre Lake not open because of them.

big rockpile

[no1butcherman]

CENTRARCHIDAE FAMILY; also called calico bass, papermouth, bachelor perch

Native to most of the eastern half of the U.S.A., the black crappie has stocked throughout been so extensively transplanted that today it almost entirely blankets the U.S. and reaches up into southern Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec in Canada. It is only noticeably scarce in a swathe of the midwest stretching from western Texas up through Nevada, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Idaho and western Montana, and even these states have black crappies either along their borders or in limited internal areas.

Crappies are members of the sunfish and black bass family, and though they show a definite family resemblance, they are distinctive enouth that they shouldn’t be confused with any other speciesl. The black crappie and the white crappie (Pomoxis annularis) are most often confused with each other. Despite their common names, both species are the same color (dark olive or black dorsally with silvery sides) and both have spots on the sides. However, the pattern of the spotting is distinctly different. In the black crappie the spots are more or less irregular and scattered while in the white crappie the spots may be more vague and are clearly arranged into 7 9 vertical bars on the sides. Another distinction; the black crappie has 7 8 dorsal spines while the white crappie has only 6, the same number as in its anal fin. In body shape the black crappie is somewhat deeper than the white crappie.

The black crappie inhabits large ponds and shallow areas of lakes, with sandy or muddy bottoms and usually in areas of abundant vegetation. It requires a deeper, clearer, somewhat cooler habitat than does the white crappie. It is an abundant species and is important both commercially and as a sport fish. Black crappies are easily caught, often as fast as the hook can be rebaited

[no1butcherman]

CENTRARCHIDAE FAMILY; also called papermouth, bachelor perch

Native to the eastern half of the U.S. and southern Ontario west of the Appalachians, this species has also been introduced throughout the continental United Stares. It is missing from most of peninsular Florida and from some north, central and midwestern states.

The white crappie and black crappie (Pomoxis nigromaculatus) are two of the most distinctive members of the sunfish and black bass family. Crappies closely resemble the sunfish with their deep, roundish (in profile), greatly compressed bodies and small heads. The crappies can be identified even at a distance by their lighter colored bodies (olive to black above, with silvery sides) generously covered with black spots (though the spots are often more vague in the white crappie), and by their almost identical dorsal and anal fins.

Crappies can be distinguished from each other by the number of spines in the dorsal fin; 6 in the white crappie and 7 8 in the black crappie. The white crappie is the only sunfish with the same number of spines in both the dorsal and anal fins. Also, the spots on the white crappie are neatly arranged into 7 9 vertical bars on the sides, whereas in the black crappie the spots are scattered in an irregular fashion. In the white crappie the spots are sometimes vaguer, which may explain the names “white” and “black” crappie since in fact both fish are essentially the same color. The dorsal, anal, and tail fins are also spotted or mottled in both species, but the paired fins (pectorals and ventrals) are never spotted. As in all the sunfishes, the dorsal spines run together with the dorsal rays, but in the crappies, the spines and rays look distinctly like a single fin rather than like two connected fins.

The white crappie is not a bottom dweller and prefers shallower water than the black crappie. It is also better able to tolerate areas of high turbidity, being found in warm, weedy bays, silted streams, lakes, ponds, and muddy, slow moving areas of larger rivers. Like the black crappie, it is considered an excellent food and sport fish and has white flaky meat that is of excellent quality

[Nimrod]

"Crappie have a way of taking over Small lakes."

I'm not sure how this works?

Red Lake is two large, connected basins in NW MN. The southern basin and the southern half of the northern basin is indian reservation. The indians netted the walleyes completly out of the lake. I could have bought a lake cabin for $5000 after that but passed. With the top predator gone the crappies got enormus. They took over the fishery and brought in lots of anglers. Then the tribe worked out a deal with the DNR and they re-stocked walleyes. Now things are back to normal.

[Chuck R.]

We went out for an hour this morning on our 9 acre pond, caught 7 decent Crappie, a few bass, and a couple Blue Gill. Pictured are a couple of the ones my boy caught.






So far the bass seem to be keeping the Crappie in check.

Chuck