The crappie tipped my rod with a resounding “thump” on the boat. I set the hook and started reeling.
My crappie jig tipped with a euro larva was probably 30 feet deep. I soon reeled up the half-pound crappie and added it to a half-full live well. I flipped on a flashlight and tipped my bait with a piece of Crappie Candy. Soon another crappie was soundly hooked.
The day had been stifling hot and an occasional night breeze felt good. Other lights around the lake showed that we were not the only crappie fishermen out on a hot August night.
Successful fishermen agree that anyone can catch hot-weather crappie – when they can find them. Most crappie are caught in the spring when mature fish move into the shallows to spawn. Just about any fisherman can find enough crappie to fill an early-season fish sack, but finding summertime crappie in big numbers is a different story.
Crappie move from the shallows to deeper water when summer heat takes over. Then submerged standing timber found on deep flats becomes a favorite crappie haunt. They have better oxygen, more bait fish and a more comfortable place to live.
Strangely enough, of the hundreds of trees scattered around a flat, only a few may hold crappie. Experienced fishermen know to fish around the trees with more branches. Heavier cover attracts more baitfish and thus, crappie.
Sonar is useful in determining how many branches are on a submerged tree or even how many fish are suspended around the trunk. Fishermen without sonar learn to find likely looking cover and drop anchors and minnows or jigs.
Determining fish productivity around a tree is easy with sonar. Circle the tree while making sure your transducer, the submerged part that send signals back to your screen, passes within a few feet of the trunk. This will allow you to see where the branches are thickest and where fishing will be the best. Then anchor off close to the tree and continue watching your screen.
Crappie can sometimes be located close to cliffs and submerged rock islands. Small pockets of brush around these long, rocky expanses attract crappie and are easily located by sonar.
I discovered this by fishing in a small lake by Kansas City when the air temperature was more than 100 degrees. The crappie had disappeared from the beds, and a friend’s depth finder found fish scattered in groups along a long, rocky flat. We cruised back and forth, watching the depth finder and caught a crappie every time we stopped over a spot that showed fish on his screen.
Open water crappie usually school in big numbers and are easily found on a sonar screen, especially today’s modern versions that can almost count the spots on a fish. Piers and floating docks with submerged crappie beds can be productive summer water when the beds are deep enough to support a good source of oxygen. The relentless summer sun beats down on the surface, stripping oxygen out of the shallows.
Years ago we discovered that crappie and other game fish suspend and feed around giant bridge pillars or suspended bridges on lakes and in rivers. Some pillars are well lit from the bridge lights, attracting insects and small fish. This sound structure with or without illumination attracts game fish feeding on shad and minnow that visit the pillars for food.
We start by anchoring off close to the pillars early in the morning and cast a 1/16-ounce plastic jig just past the concrete. We retrieve after the jig sinks a few feet and rubs against the pillar.
Years ago my brother, Rodney, set the hook on what he thought was a crappie under bridge pillars. The fish quickly doubled his lightweight rod. He stood there and watched 40 yards of line tear off his reel. The healthy fish sounded with remarkable power that lasted about 10 minutes with numerous runs like a runaway torpedo.
Finally our net slipped under the 5-pound wiper, a cross between a white bass and a striper. I was amazed at the power and stamina of this remarkable fish. Soon we both hooked onto another crappie.
You might catch almost any species when fish are suspended around bridges or other structures. These fish were suspended above 100 feet of water in the main channel. We might have even caught more on live minnows.
We caught numerous fish when most areas of the lake were barely giving up bites. Later that morning we tried some crappie beds submerged in 18- to 20-foot depths. We managed to catch a pair of smaller crappie before returning to the bridge.
Our return was celebrated by a parade of huge inboard/outboard boats making loud rumbling sounds as they barely passed the bridge before “cranking” up their engines. The inflow of wake from these powerful boats must have helped – the crappie seemed to respond by feeding.
We both caught more crappie in choppy water and nothing over a smooth surface. The crappie simply did not respond when the surface was smooth. But soon a combination of rising summertime temperatures and the arrival of more boat traffic gave reason to call it a day.
Some crappie structure like bridge pillars are visible. Finding other hot-weather crappie feeding areas requires electronic aids. Sonar units are important for navigating at night, a common time to fish for hot-weather crappie. The human eye loses some perception at night, making shoreline reference points less reliable than during the day.
A sonar unit’s depth perception remains near perfect on the darkest night by tracing the bottom contour and displaying fish and structure with normal accuracy.
Experienced fishermen warn that sonar are not equal in performance, especially after sundown. The newer versions with adequate backlighting and controls work great, while models with poor lighting systems are useless.
Trolling is another great crappie fishing technique during hot weather. Many troll under structure like bridges and along submerged creek channels. Suspended crappie hit passing bait fish. But they are not generally aggressive, so move your bait slowly. I prefer at least 1/16-ounce jigs. They are heavier and sink deeper faster.
Bait for the techniques mentioned is about the same as spring baits. Minnows, jigs tipped or not tipped and small lures work best. Again, try heavier jigs when fishing depths. You can tip jigs with minnows, generally hooked behind the head, euro larvae, meal worms, small pieces of nightcrawler, commercial crappie baits like Crappie Candy and some even use crickets. The key is an extra incentive for the crappie to bite your jig.
Hot-weather crappie fishing success is possible with a combination of finding productive feeding spots and sometime using sonar. The key is to remember a lot of mosquito repellent and liquids. You can still get dehydrated at night during the long, hot summertime and those mosquitoes will be happy to dine on you.
