Gettin Back After Them

[Jerry Blake]

I took three days off over Memorial Day Weekend and was afraid the good-ole-biguns might be hard to find this morning after all the ruckus that went on while I was away. But much to my surprise the good-ole-biguns were bunched up right where they were supposed to be and doing some very serious post-spawn snacking.

The two biggest white crappie were 17-inches long and we had another that was 1/4"-inch shorter. None of them were over two pounds though with all the weight they've lost while spawning. The biggest black crappie was 16.5-inches long and weighed 2-pounds, 1-ounce.

Here are a few close-ups of some of the better fish:

I guess we had a dozen or so that were in the 15 to 17-inch range and another couple dozen or so in the 13 to 15-inch range. With all the eaters, a few D-fish and several suicides we came in with 100-crappie, 3-spotted bass and 2-white bass that yielded 24-pounds, 7-ounces of fillets.

Since I had Owen, my 12-year-old Deck Hand, along we were able to keep 5-limits of crappie and we must have released another 40 or 50 D-fish. I was sure glad Owen was along because we were getting doubles and triples all morning and there were times that even with both of us netting fish and baiting hooks we couldn't keep all the lines in the water.

We caught a few fish on hair jigs tipped with minnows but rosy red minnows and shiners on light wire bream hooks under slip floats were most productive. We fished from 10 to 14-feet deep mostly over Bamboo Crappie Condos but also a few brushpiles. We started fishing about 7:00 and came in a little after noon. It took about an hour and a half to fillet and bag everything even with my crew cutting out rib cages for me.

These folks are some of my "regulars" and they've fished with me a lot but this was the best trip they've had with me for average size and numbers. It will be hard to top for sure.

I wonder how the bite will be tomorrow....................................

[Eager Beaver]

Fantastic job as always Jerry. EB

[Bob # 1]

Very Good Jerry
Proud of you

[abarkley]

Nice stringer

[CJ21]

Nice mess of crappie.

[soswine]

Awesome trip!!

[OkieDon]

Thanks for sharing Jerry, I was getting withdrawal symptoms waiting on your next post!

[frank lawhead]

Way to go Jerry--its unreal the nice fish that you get your clients

[fishman78]

24 Pounds of FILLETS!!!! Good job man!!

[Fatman]

Nice bag of fish!!!!!!!!!!!!! That sounds like a bunch of kamikazi fish!!!!!

Fatman