QDM for Crappie?

[whackmaster]

By now most of us outdoors people have heard of QDM (quality deer management ) its all the rage. For those that haven't it is basically a principal where as you help the environment by planting bedding feeding areas, fetilizing for better nutrition..etc., letting smaller bucks walk instead of shooting them so they grow into trophies and controlling populations by taking more or fewer does ...so why can't we start an initiative where us crappie folks adopt some principals to adhere to instead of the state regs ? Any opinions?

[GRIZZ]

I've heard Charlie Alsheimer speak 4-5 times and its fascinating to see what they have done with QDM here in NY, and the amazing deer it has produced. The problem I think we will run into that the QDM people don't as much is that they are cooperatively managing private property where in order for us as private citizens to do the same thing with crappie it would be hard to get anything done without working hand in hand with the local DNR or whatever they call it in your neck of the woods and they tend to look at us as the great unwashed masses and would not want our input. At least thats the way they are up here, but from what it looks like Darryl and Jerry have going down in their neck of the wood maybe down south they aren't as uppity.

Its a great idea if we could get a cooperative effort of influential anglers, management personnel, and who knows maybe even corporate sponsors. Sure would be fun. It would take some time though just like with the deer, and maybe even longer because typically most harvested deer are 2-3 yrs old and a really old deer is 5-7 yrs where with crappies those numbers are easily doubled.

[pstone]

I been letting a bunch of fish go for years, the problem is people LOVE to eat crappie, regardles of size. The difference in deer and crappie is that you can shoot a doe to eat, but how do you decide what crappie to keep, and which one to throw back. I'd like to hear what a Biologist thinks about QCM...

[TnRidge]

It works great for deer , but Crappie become overpopulated and stunted very quickly .
I'm going to adhere to the state regs ,and take some home for the frying pan .