Most experienced anglers consider water temperature in conjunction with the time of the year as the two most critical factors that govern crappie location and biting behavior. This article will help you to pinpoint crappie location—winter into the spring; help you with the various types of fishing rigs; and will help you understand proper bait presentation tactics, so you too can spend more time fishing and catching crappies and less time aimlessly searching and scratching your head—and wondering why you’re not.

Water Temperature

Crappies are well-known to be cold-blooded, which means they do not and cannot control their internal body temperature. As a result, crappies’ entire metabolism is strongly influenced by the temperature of their surrounding environment. Therefore, crappies generally try to hold at depths and in water temperatures that best provide the optimum “comfort zone.” This optimum temperature range varies, however, throughout the colder and warmer seasons and throughout the year and because of this… crappie fishing enthusiasts, including myself, believe that larger crappies tend to have better cold water tolerance than do smaller crappies. This may be a factor why larger crappies are generally found holding somewhat deeper than smaller crappies throughout most of the year.

As an example of this: My last few trips to Harris Reservoir, here in Central North Carolina, in the month of January, I fished nothing but deep water creek channels in 32 – 35 feet of water… I fished nothing but Carolina rigs with live minnows… I consistently held the bait at 10 – 20 inches off the bottom… and all fish that I caught during each of those trips were good keeper sized slabs… I caught 80-some crappie and only very few fish that were under 10 inches.