Hillsdale 4/23

[kscrappeye]

With the long range weather forecast looking windy and wet for next weekend's crappie camp at Melvern Lake, I decided to take advantage of the nice day and get the family out on the water for a few hours this afternoon at Hillsdale.

Anticipating that a lot of folks would have a similar idea and the wife had other things to accomplish, I headed out a couple hours earlier to scope things out and hopefully find a few fish before the rest of the family made it out to the lake.

Checked several spots that have been productive in the past and found one area with a small bit of brush in about 20' of water that held fish. Fished tandem jigs with fish being anywhere from 10-16' in down. Had 9 keepers (11-12") when the wife called. Ran in to pick them up. Went back to the same spot and picked up 6 more before calling it an evening. I did tip the kids jigs with a minnow which seemed to help them pick up a few more bites.

I fished jigs only. Bite was pretty solid from 3:30 to 6:00. Not bad for a short outing. Fish moved around a bit and you had to stay on them with the electronics but did not move more than 50-60' away from the small brush.

Pretty much anything with chartreuse caught fish today. Now we just need the weather to change for next weekend for camp....

[kansascrappy]

Looks like you were getting a bite while she was holding up that fish!
Wow, really good outing! Especially all those keepers.
That's interesting they were in such deep of water. We caught em at Clinton in about 3 feet of water.
Did you try any shallow water?
Anybody else finding them in deep water?

[kansascrappy]

There was a ton of boats at Clinton yesterday. Was Hillsdale packed as well?

[kscrappeye]

Hillsdale was busy but not packed. I was hooked up in the first picture. Did fish shallow for a little while after the kids left with their mom. Did not have any luck. With the cold front that moved through I figured the shallow bite may have been a little tough so I focused on deeper water. Seems to be more consistent for me this time of the year. Plus it's easier for the kids to drop it straight down then to cast and work around timber and such. My catching was limited try to keep the boat positioned, two seven year olds, and my wife all in order. But they all caught a few and had fun which was the most important aspect.

[kansascrappy]

That's awesome! I hope to have a beautiful daughter one day that I can go fishing with.
You mentioned that the fish remained 50 to 60 feet from the brush. were you able to stay on them through side imaging? Or just using regular sonar?
I've been thinking seriously about getting side imaging to find schools of fish but I have no idea how hard it is to see schools of fish on side imaging. I know side imaging is atleast really good for finding structure .

[kscrappeye]

I use side and down imaging a lot. In this case, I was able to stay on top of them with regular sonar. Just kept moving around to stay on top of them. They weren't moving much.