Help me find some winter hot spots-chart included.

[TapOut64]

Here's a chart of the main lake portion of a lake I fish in SE VA. The lake is 946 acres with the channel running 30'-35' deep. The depth lines are in 5' increments. I've been having luck fishing under a bridge thats 20'-26' deep but the crappie seem to be moving out. I figured some of you pros could give me some ideas of where to search for them.

[bama647]

that might as well be greek to me but crappie are litterally everywhere . just find trees laying down in the water or boathouses or steep dropoffs. target water thats 10 to 20 ft deep right now. could be even deeper.

[Jerry Blake]

Hey TO64:

It looks like there is a very defined creek channel running through your lake. I would be looking for crappie this time of year on the drop-offs or "ledges" on the that channel - what used to be the creek bank before the lake was formed. Inside bends in the creek channel are real good locations as well as points that extend into or even close to the channel.

Just taking a quick look at that map I see a couple dozen places where I'd be sinking cover the first chance I got!

[tarheel]

Throw 5 to 10 poles out tight line at different depths in the main channel. Move slowly (1/2 mph) toward the shore lines and try to go over a point whenever possible. Mark the spots where you get doubles and note the depth. Then try to find identical water around the lake to where you caught the doubles.

[Jeff Schiller]

I also see a few humps, with a few that run in close proximity to the creek channel. One in particular that's on the south side, right in the middle. Looks like it has fast changing water depths with creek channel access to a potential spawning grounds.

The good thing about that particular location is that if you run through your fast depth changes there, you could pattern yourself a depth at which the fish are staying. That could lead you to other waters.

I agree that there's an awful lot of places to drop some cover too.