Mississippi River Pool 26 Questions

[Camalama]

I live here in St. Charles, just west of St. Louis (for those not familar), and my typical fishing area is Pool 26 (the Alton Pool) of the Mississippi River. Most guys I see fishing are fishing for catfish. I like catfish and all, but not exactly exciting. When I take my buddies out fishing, we bass fish, and to be honest, we don't do very well, but we are learning. I have never thought about fishing for crappie on the river, but the more I talk to people, the more I heare about people catching crappie. Some say to fish the docks in the marinas, some say to fish sloughs. I understand the oxbow lakes and ponds are great, but I like to fish from my boat so I need to get there from the main river.

I did a search on the board prior to this post and I see there are a few river fishermen on here. I also found that most fish the back waters of the river and in creeks. What I didn't see on here is what I should be looking for. Deep water, shallow water? When you are fishing behind a wing dam, are you fishing the rocks, out off the rocks? There are not a lot of standing trees on the river, so I'm having a hard time envisioning what I am looking for. Also, what are you using? Niblets and jigs, minnow and jig? I assume you just dabble and move. I'm going to have to give it a try next time I'm out. I'm sure I'll get some odd looks, but that's the way it goes.

Any information is appreciated.

Cameron

Hunting and Fishing in Missouri

[wharfrat]

Ok, I've only fished it twice, many years ago. But the first time me and my hunting buddy were building our duck blind around Dresser Island (before the pullovers, so that should tell you how long ago it was). It was late Sept/ early Oct. and we saw a couple of boats tearing the crappie up in the main slough before you got into the island. The next weekend we finished up our blind and decided to try our luck dipping jigs along the blow downs on the main channel and caught enough for a good fry for our families. Nothing big, but a couple dozen 9-11" fish. The next spring we went out there in early march, and didn't do too well with jigs, but started dipping minnows and caught a few until we went in the first cove off the river on the south end of the island, you can't miss it, there is a duck blind in the middle of the cove, one outside the cove off of the point, and at that time there were two blinds in the far back of the cove, and that's where we caught a bunch. It was cold, overcast, calm, and the fish were in about a foot to 2 foot of water.

Again nothing big, but quite a few 9-10 inchers. Didn't throw back very many dinks, and minnows seemed to be the only thing they'd hit.

We went back there late april, but I don't think we caught enough to clean.

[Camalama]

Good to know. I'm going to try it tomorrow night if the rain doesn't get me. Worth a shot. Going to use niblets just 'cause I don't want to mess with minnows if they aren't biting. Thanks again for the info.

Cameron

[wharfrat]

Good Luck! Let us know how you did!
Another good spot is some sloughs north of Grafton on the Illinois River.
Used to fish them early in the year (late Feb/early Mar).

[Camalama]

Just to follow up here, we didn't catch any crappie. We did get a nice bass on the end of a 10' rod with 4lb line. That was a fun little fight. Lots of sunfish, but no crappie. We'll keep trying the river and report back.