Late Spring Crappie - by Slabrus

After a 17 hour drive,arriving back in Beaverton at 4:30am Tuesday from our quick four day trip to see our sons promotion to Sergeant at the Marine Corps Air Station in North Carolina, I was ready for a lot of sleep and to just chill the day away. But apparently there were other plans for me that day as I woke after just four hours of sleep. I was still very tired, in fact almost exhausted, but I could hear the calmness of the lake calling me. There was very little boat traffic and the wind was calm so I figured it would be as relaxing in my kayak on the water as it was on the couch. I grabbed my paddle and a bottle of water and headed out the door. Oh, and of course I also took my fishing gear, just in case.




I have found over the years that as Spring winds down, smallmouth bass and crappies start to show up in good numbers along the shores of the main lake away from the typical spawning grounds. It takes some of these main lake areas longer to warm than the shallow bays, so they are often overlooked as good fishing spots. As I eased into the water and started making my way down the shoreline I stopped for a minute to tie on a jig and talk to one of our neighbors who was on his dock fishing. As I saw him reel in one nice crappie I was reassured about my hunch as to where the fish might be, so I wished him luck and paddled on.




As I eased my kayak along I made casts toward any structure protruding from the bank or visible under the surface. I was questioning whether I might need a bobber to keep the bait suspended in the likely fish holding areas due to the water being stained brown from all the recent rain, but that question was answered quickly as I felt a quick thump on my line. I slowly raised my rod tip and could immediately tell I had a crappie on the line. The fish hit my lure just six feet from my kayak, which I positioned only ten feet from the seawall. A couple turns of the reel and I had my first late spring crappie in the kayak. I noticed a couple submerged branches and pieces of wood in the area where I caught that first crappie, in just 12 inches of water, so I made another cast to that same spot. Once again I felt the telltale thump of a crappie, and began reeling in one after another. In the course of seven or eight minutes I was able to pull a dozen nice specks off that one section of structure before moving on.


Just down the shoreline I positioned myself about eight feet off shore, next to a twenty foot section of riprap. I then let out six and a half feet of line and simply flipped my lure toward the rocks. My little jig was instantly inhaled, and with just a short bit of line out I was able to retrieve my fish without even reeling. And so went the next twenty minutes, just dangling my line six feet from the kayak, and sweeping it slowly back and forth, pulling in nine to inch crappies until I had my 25 fish limit. Another great finish to a wonderful weekend in Gladwin County.