They'll grow up, just might take a little longer in your area due shorter spring and summer you have.
So i've found a pond close to home that now has crappies. I think they are a recent introduction since I can't seem to catch a keeper. Here's more
Crappie Infestation? « D & B Ice Adventures's Blog let me know what you guys think.
They'll grow up, just might take a little longer in your area due shorter spring and summer you have.
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Maybe and maybe not. We have lakes around here that have signs that advise you to keep any/all crappie caught and any/all bass under 10". There are so many fish they are stunted. On H.Ville lake (~100acres) I caught over 75 crappie one day on double jig rigs dipped around cover, only 9 were what I consider keepers.
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I wish there were more of those ponds here in Vermont!!!!!!!! I hear ya on the drive - I have to go all the way up to Champlain and that's iffy on crappie. And the no-lead policy on the Conn River is BS!!!!!!!!!! Have Bakers Pond which is between Northfield and Randolph on Rt12 and someone illegally introduced Bass into it years ago, plus they stock it with Trout every year.
We've been begging them to put crappie in it, with the fishing on this pond they wouldn't be able to get stunted as so many fish there. Would love to have something close by!!!!
sometimes u just gotta catch em out before the ruin the rest of the pond
I think that's whats going on with our lake. Even i can catch 4"-8" crappie in it! Caught some gills today that made the crappie look small.
Put you a couple big flathead in there. The crappie are over populated. Had the same problem in our pond. We could catch 250 in an afternoon, every cast, but you could hold em up, they'd be 6 " long and you could read a newspaper through them. After we put a pair of 6lb flathead (Which grew up in a few years to be very large 30lb +) , now we catch 1/2 dozen or so in an afternoon, but they are now 12" crappie. Doesn't hurt to get some minnows in there either.
They may or they may not. Depends more than anything on the size of the water. Ponds overpopulate real easy. Lakes say maybe 50-100 acres and over and flowages generally do not. On the bigger waters it is definitely true that life expectancy is a much more important factor in the production of larger crappies, especially in the north where it may take 6-8 years and more under the best conditions to grow a true slab. Up here in Minnesota human harvest can be a very important factor that keeps crappie size down. We have a pair of lakes close to each other here in the cities, the one with the consumption advisories produces much better size than the one without. There wasn't a difference before the consumption advisories, which significantly discouraged harvest, were posted either.
Small crappie size isn't really a cut and dried thing, always showing stunting from overpopulation, but in some places that is real. Generally the smaller the water the more likely that kind of stunting, because large enough predation is much more unlikely.
In many places transplanting flatheads is against the law; it certainly is here in Minnesota. So be careful what you move around and where.
Our city lake is 550 acres. has about every species in it. Creek and run-off (mainly farm) is how its fed. The size of the shad is big. Most of the shad i've seen are as big as the crappie! Both black and white crappie present. Flatheads, blue's, and channels present.
doesn't really say what size that pond is in the blog but if the pond is small the crappie size could be stunt also other factors come in to play