WHAT COLOR LED'S FOR CRAPPIE AT NIGHT ???

[ezgoing]

I fished with a combination of both white and green a few years back they worked so well at drawing in minnows there must have been a million of 'em; which made my little minnow lost in the crowd we didn't catch nothing that night but you could see the crappie bust'en threw the bait ball just too much competition for my bait to get noticed.

From my experience crappie do not enter the circle of light. White and black bass do, they are usually the ones breaking up the bait balls.
Crappie stay just outside the light circle and wait to ambush minnows leaving the light circle. Probably the minnows are fleeing the bass inside the light circle.

I have caught bass inside the light circle but never any crappie. That is why I use a slip float and throw my jig beyond the light circle and slowly retrieve it back through the light circle and out the other side. I catch a few crappie before I enter the light circle but I catch most of them as I leave the light circle on the other side.

If you do it this way your minnow is not one in a million that lost in the crowd. It's one of a smaller number of minnows that is either trying to enter the light circle or is leaving the light circle.

[Lonnie84]

Make since I'll have to dust my lights off again.

[Rammer1961]

Well I tried a green light last night here in Mississippi, and our dingy dirty water did absolutely nothing. Dropped the light 5' and you couldn't even tell the was a light down there. Did not even get a single bite. $35 down the drain. Oh well live and learn. The kids and I did have fun night fishing though

Sent from my SM-G960U using Crappie.com Fishing mobile app

I myself went Friday night (FULL MOON, knew better but) to a bridge I usually fish with good results but I don't have much luck if the moon is even close to full on a clear night and this was one of those nights. Caught one strip bass and zero crappie. There have been times that they were biting really good but after the moon got up good they slowed down and eventually quit. Bright moon nights just aren't as productive from my past experiences over the years.

[Rammer1961]

From my experience crappie do not enter the circle of light. White and black bass do, they are usually the ones breaking up the bait balls.
Crappie stay just outside the light circle and wait to ambush minnows leaving the light circle. Probably the minnows are fleeing the bass inside the light circle.

I have caught bass inside the light circle but never any crappie. That is why I use a slip float and throw my jig beyond the light circle and slowly retrieve it back through the light circle and out the other side. I catch a few crappie before I enter the light circle but I catch most of them as I leave the light circle on the other side.

If you do it this way your minnow is not one in a million that lost in the crowd. It's one of a smaller number of minnows that is either trying to enter the light circle or is leaving the light circle.

ezgoing. . . I totally agree. For years I used two or three 14ft crappie poles with corks fishing 5 to 8 feet deep and tight lines on rod-n-reels. The poles always caught more crappie. Now I use 8 and 10 ft ACC Crappie Stix rod-n-reel rigs with slip bobbers. That's the ticket for sure. I just installed (2) 12ft Snake Tube LED green light strips I ordred from SouthernLiteLed.com, one on each side just under bump rails (a switch for each) on my 17' stick steer fishing boat. They look awesome. I plan on ordering 2 more white LED strips to go just below the green LED strips and put on separate switches.

[Rammer1961]

I love to crappie fish at night more so than day time. I use (2) green submergible LED lights currently, one near the front and one near the rear of the boat. I'm wanting to install some LED light strips just under the rub rail to shine on the water surface. My question is which color is more productive for Crappie... Green or White. Back in the 90's I used the white floating lamps and the Aqua Star submergible. Caught lots of Crappie with them just killed the battery in 6 or 7 hours. When LED's hit the market I started using the Green LED 2ft submergible sticks. Would love to get opinions of the members of tried and tested colors that work BEST before installing the LED strip lights. Found some I really like from Southern Lite LED. Thank you for your feedback.

UPDATE: I just have ordered a 24" AlumiGlo SuperBrite-X2 8000 submergible LED fishing light that has both White and Green LED's. It has 3 conductors (one for negative, one for white, one for green) so you can have just white light or green light or you can have both white and green at the same time. Has a total of 432 LED's for 7,907 Lumens. Found it at www.fishinglightsetc.com . . They come in 3 different lengths, 12", 24", and 48". This is what I have been looking for, dual color lights best of both worlds !! Here is a link to a video with all the details about these lights in case anyone is interested.

www.facebok.com/FishingLightsEtc/videos/1009964495705351/

[Rammer1961]

Did you do any good fishing at night like this? I'm planning on doing the same thing tomorrow night. Never have crappie fished at night but my idea was to drop the light, anchor the boat and wait with poles tipped with minnows in the water. The light I bought today has green LED.
On the box if says that green attracts plankton. Which In turn attracts bait fish then the big fish is what it says. Hopefully it works just like that.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Crappie.com Fishing mobile app

Pithon.. Yes I have had good catches at night over the past 30 years. Especially in Spring and Summer. plus you don't have a lot of boat traffic at night. Been catching some good Crappie so far the last five weekends. Caught some cats and stripped bass too. I've got a new 24" LED fishing light coming tomorrow, it has white and green LED's (432 total) you can run the white or green LED's or run both white and green LED' at the same time.

SuperBrite-X2 8000 24 Dual Green-White LED.jpg (4.5 KB) Green-White LED 24 inch.jpg (4.6 KB)

[hdhntr]

problem I have is I can't stay up that late! have played around with LED member gave me but it drained my trolling battery down so fast. going to play around with one for my dock as we just dropped bunch of cedar next to my pontoon in open slot. especially for the grandkids.

[hdhntr]

great thread and lots of valuable info. will they place this in electronics forum?

[Rammer1961]

problem I have is I can't stay up that late! have played around with LED member gave me but it drained my trolling battery down so fast. going to play around with one for my dock as we just dropped bunch of cedar next to my pontoon in open slot. especially for the grandkids.

That's a bummer hdhntr. I use to use (2) 55 watt head lamp floating lights and the 100 watt Aqua Star quartz halogen fishing light and a couple 50 watt clamp-on lights several years ago and would kill the battery in 7 or 8 hours. Now I use all LED's, (2) clamp lights -w- 10 watt LEDs on a 120V inverter, 2 submergible LEDs, and a green SnakeTube LED strip light under the bump rail to illuminate the waters surface. I can go all night with no problem on my deep cycle battery. I do miss the Aqua Star, it put out a hot light. Good luck on the dock light. BTY, have you checked out the submergible dock lights and other fishing lights at fishinglightsetc.com ?? That's where I got mine at. They have some nice options to choose from.

[Rammer1961]

great thread and lots of valuable info. will they place this in electronics forum?

Thank you hdhntr! I don't know if it would pertain to electronics. Would be NICE to have a sub-forum just for "NIGHT FISHING" if there isn't one. That would be awesome for guys that are really into fishing at night.