DMW1960 with a nice mess of Crappie.
I arrive at the campground, and everyone is already in a festive mood. Many have been there for a couple days so camp was already rolling along nicely. Above are a few pics from before I arrived that DMW1960 and Little Skeeter posted. The office to the place had very strange hours. They were only open like 2 hours a day. So instead of getting my own site, I just put up my test between JR’s 5th wheel camper and Rick and Dales camp site (good to see you guys again). I got my tent up fast before nightfall. There was no wind, so I did not even stake it down, it was all good.
Sorry for the blurry picture Rick, you were moving too fast. lol It was good to see Rick and Dale again.
I found out member LSLAngler had an open seat on his boat in the morning, so he invited me to come along. I was shocked, I thought I was the only one that towed a boat with a sedan any more. It was good to see LSLAngler doing the same. Kinda cool, wish I got a picture.
So we hit a few spots that Mark had been lucky with before, but not many fish this time. We were essentially single pole fishing 10-15 feet of water with jigs tipped with an artificial small Shad. We casted to the docks and to other known structure, letting it sink for 5-7 seconds before a slow retrieve. After a couple hours we had one keeper, and very slow action.
LSLAngler with the only keeper while I was fishing with him.
At about mid day, we tried what looked to be a large series of abandoned floating docks. There was one boat in one slip, with a fisherman on it. The fisherman told us he had caught some nice crappie on live minnows right there. We threw our jigs deep inside some other slips and caught a mess of crappie. Probably a couple dozen. But unlike the fisherman with the live minnows, none of ours were keepers. We had lots of fun catching crappie, but soon got tired of catching nothing but small ones.
Slabscab and his lovely wife pulled up and told us about a couple spots on the lake to try. We hit those spots but came up empty, only a couple very small bass. We did find the structure Slabscab was talking about, but the fish finders, and our jigs told us there were no fish to be found on those spots at that time. Oh well.
So here’s where it gets better. LSLAngler brings me back to shore so I could get on my computer for an hour or so before the weigh in, and he ends up going back out by himself. He tells me he sees a shore fisherman walking away form a dock with seemingly a bucket full of fish. He scoots his boat there to the front of that dock, and catches a limit of nice crappie in about an hours time. Oh well, another story of me being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Good for you LSLAngler, good job.
Cookieman catches the big fish, and it was a nice fish, 1.7 lbs.
Dan raffled off a whole bunch of Fireworks, plus a rod donated by Namgrunt, and a few other Crappie.com things. He raised $150 and to donated it all to Crappie.com. I had not asked for this, it was a very generous act. I thank everyone that participated. But, this got me thinking. In 2011 I donated a little money to a couple families related to Crappie.com members that suffered losses during the Joplin disaster. So, for 2012, this $150 will start a new fund I will keep for victims of similar tragedies. Adding to the fund will be the proceeds generated by the 2012 Crappie.com calendar project. You all may know that I have a calendar picture contest going on. See http://www.crappie.com/crappie/conte...andidates.html
Fellow member Yikess offered to create professional calenders for us for a great price (essentially wholesale). He did some last year for the MS members. The thing is, I have to order 1000 of them, and since I do not believe I can sell 1000 of them on the site before the end of the year (they are calendars, they are date sensitive), I am not going to sell them. I am going to give them away, to the first 1000 members (I’ll figure out the process to determine the first 1000 later on). Anyway, The calendars plus a Crappie.com boat decal (larger decal than the small car window decal many already have), will be given away free. I will ask for donations of any amount to cover mailing and the cost of making the calendars, but you will not have to donate anything to get a one. Any money received above the cost to mail, and the cost to make the calendars will be added to the $150 already in the Crappie.com Disaster Relief Fund (additional details will come later).
You see that big pile of wood, well look below, it's all in that monster fire that Little Skeeter is stoking up.
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JR and his dad enjoying the monster fire.
KCMO CrappieSlayer and Rick. It was good to finally meet you Slayer.
Couple more pics below provided by DMW1960, likely taken by the Fireworks Packing Queen, Paula (although she is pictured below there with DW). I had a great time, it was a pleasure meeting everyone, some for the first time. I'm not going to try to mention every ones names here cause I know I'd accidentally leave some out, but a good time was certainly had by all. I'd like to thank everyone that attended and especially Paula and Dan, who hosted the event on their site. Paula kept busy cleaning up after all our gewberness. And I thank Bugman for choosing the location arranging the event via Crappie.com. I'd also like to thank LSLAngler for taking me out on the water. I'm sure many more thanks are in order for those that brought food, and provided donations, and cleaned fish, cooked and in general, helping out, so thank you all very much. Till next time.
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