Originally Posted by
pab1981
I fish Kentucky and Barkley, they are flood control lakes on the Tennessee and Cumberland river chains. Gizzard shad are present in both lakes but don’t remember ever having a crappie spit up a full grown gizzard shad or found any cleaning fish. Threadfin, baby drum, and log perch, even small bluegill are much more common food sources here. Crappie will definitely eat big baits, but not all of them all the time. We used to catch a bunch of crappie on small lakes around where I grew up on 1/2oz rattle traps and big plastic worms while bass fishing.
Seen them hit 3/8 oz. spinnerbaits with double #5 willow leaf blades in the spring while Bass fishing. Crappie here used to bigger baits since we don't have Threadfins. High Crappie numbers guess there is lots of competition for food .
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