We’ll get thru this just like we did with spider rigging and side scanning. The catch rate and weights went up after they came out too.
"G" LIKED above post
Here in Indiana, our big lakes (resivours) have suffered greatly due to high water with dams closed by COE causing high water to kill all our buck brush and grass weed beds. Loss of cover, explosion of gizzard shad and we have lost crappie especially in keeper size. Throw in, fishing pressure on the lakes left with crappie populations, and I, like everybody here, we are seeing less keeper sized fish. Add new electronics, and finally people are learning how to use them, decrease in populations. We keep selling more boats, educating the masses on how to fish and use equipment, and loss of crappie populations as well. Throw in a lax DNR, that has only taken 2 small lakes of about no more than 1500 acres with a 9” size limit keeping our 25 fish limits,,and nothing has improved the crappie populations. If it wasn’t for advanced electronics we have today and knowing how to use them, I wouldn’t be able to catch a limit of 10” plus size limit of crappie. I am just one of the masses in our state, that relies on these advanced electronics, but if the combination of our problems is not rectified, Indiana will continue to see keeper populations continuing to decline. Most of the major crappie tourneys now avoid our 2 largest lakes so I prove my comments.
PROUD MEMBER OF TEAM GEEZERauthorized by: Billbob and "G"
Just a comparison thought. The Livescope Guys are not fishing with 16-32 hooks in the water at one time. Hooking, Netting, Handling, and releasing thousands of thousands of Crappie. Well they see one they want to catch and chase "One" fish down at a time. Personally I sold and installed several Livescope systems in the last 2 years to see every person who went to Livescope catch rate drop. They get hooked on the "Video Game" effect and stick a total of less fish per day. I said once before, give me a good GPS, 2D Sonar, and Sidescan, I can smoke'm. I won't even install Livescope on my boat. I use Panoptix to stay on the structure in heavy winds and tide currents. It would be a very interesting bit of detail information to know just how many fish were "Hooked" during the Grenada Crappie Masters. I bet a bit less than the spider rigging days. I use Sidescan to check for fish on submerged structure not stopping to look with Panoptix at all, takes too long. Saltwater fishing the mortality rate for a fish's turnaround time catch and release is up there, can anyone elaborate on the mortality rate of Crappie on the turnaround? Just Thinking,