Happy New Year

[Hoot]

Happy New Year to all the "Show Me" state crappie fisherman. The last couple of days have been good on the water. Caught some nice dinner crappie and enjoyed the warm temps.

Hope you all have a great 2005

Hoot

[bugman]

My 9 year old and i have been fishing lake of the ozarks the past week and like you have been enjoying the warm weather and evidently the crappie have too we went friday& sunday started by 7am and we were culling by 9am we ended up with several 13 inch fish and 4 over 14 inches. we found them in 15ft or less most were suspended 4ft but some were just under the foam on docks you could watch them hit but those were the hardest to catch.I would like to hear from all crappie fishermen always looking for a new fishing buddy ive got my old ones wore out because i fish so much i just cant get enough crappie fishing.

[TAE73]

Happy New year to everyone and hope for limits everytime out for ya.

Bugman,

Was out on LOZ friday also, fished around the purvis beach area. Had about the same luck on cullin but didnt find near the size that you did. We had maybe 2 nice big ones the rest all good eatin size. Been having good luck now since mid november. Curious to see if you have had the same problem we have been having. That as soon as you throw the fish in the livewell they some go belly's up?? Our guess is that water is alot warmer where they are, than the surface temp and they go in shock.

[bugman]

Im new to this and my typing skills are piss poor so bear with me i had that problem before the warm weather but that was when i was catching fish 15 20ft deep i had afew do that the last few days but since they were so shallow i guess the temp change wasnt that drastic

[CrappieOutlaw]

bugman, what area of the lake are you fishing?

[CrappieOutlaw]

TAE73, I think the reason they went belly up was because I havent cleaned that boat out in 6 months

[TAE73]

Nay, I dont think that would have anything to do with it, outlaw.


Bugman,

I dont think there are any English majors in here, I type and write piss poor also. I just started to seeing this problem since late nov. I do see it in the summer when its hot enough to fry a egg, but I know the reason then.



We also need to be thinking of some lakes and times for a get together????

[Jim C.]

I was told the reason they go belly up is because they are in cold deep water and come up to fast and there swin blatters have to much air in them ????.

[Hoot]

I noticed the same thing about the fish going belly up. I figured it was the different water temp as well.

Also...many of the crappie that I've caught in the last 3 days are much more colorful than those I caught just 3 weeks ago.

Their backs are a very deep blue color. Has anyone noticed this? I was curious if this is a seasonal thing.

Hoot

[TAE73]

I dont really remember lookin to see if they had alot of color. I always wondered if it has to do with the water color? I have caught a fish that was almost white no marks, and later pull that fish out of the livewell and it would have black marks showing.

I thought when the lake turned over the warmer water was on the bottom and colder water on top? Surface temp friday at loz was 36-38. I wish I had a temp gauge rigged up that I could lower over the boat to check temps at different depths.