Hello, I am new to crappie.com & really enjoying it-- I'm learning a lot from you fine folks! I came here looking for info on how to catch redears / shellcrackers, & I can tell you have more goods on this subject than anyplace else I've seen. Thanks a bunch! A few years ago I got on a sauger kick while living in Clarksville, TN, & had a blast learning how to target that species on the Cumberland River . . . while hunting them, I heard about shellcrackers, & did catch a couple small ones on jigs, purely by accident. Now I'd like to focus on redears, & so far, they're skunking me!

I'm going to tell you what I know about the lake I'm fishing & maybe you can help me out. The MO Cons. Dept. does annual electrosurveys on this body of water, & since 1994 at least, has always reported many 10"-plus redears, plus a number of other species. Primary lake forage is gizzard shad. I have been pounding crappie & walleye for years with good success, but have yet to pull in a redear, & furthermore, I've looked through the many photos in the marina & haven't seen anyone with a single redear. I know that doesn't mean nobody's getting any . . . but I really do think they are being overlooked on this particular reservoir.

The lake is about 1000 acres, mostly rocky with very little brush or timber for structure, averages deep (35-50 ft), max depth 100 feet, has good clarity, & two long arms, which are deep until about halfway back. One arm ends in a long, tapering mud flat with stump fields, the other arm ends in a long, shallow (5-14 ft) mud & rock flat with acres of very thick weed growth. I don't know what kind of weeds they are . . . bright green with thin stems & asterisk-shaped leaf bunches, & pull up from the bottom easily. There are often detached clumps floating around. In the summer or in droughts you can see big towers of these weeds, and crappie can often be caught in their shade. There are also some weeds that grow in five ft deep or less with long thin leaves.

On one of the mainlake bluff points I have seen lots of small black snails in the summer, but the water is about 70 feet immediately offshore. These snails were only about 1/4 to maybe 3/8" long . . . & seem like they'd be hard to hook as bait . . . or wouldn't yield much meat for bait. Are these the right kind of snails? I have also seen quite a few empty mussel / clam shells on the shores of some of the smaller cuts.

There is one large point that is broad & round with a sharp drop to one side & some submerged bushes & trees along the drop, where I have often graphed what appeared to be crappie in the summer but never have hooked a thing, even when I pulled lots of crappie off similar structure elsewhere in the lake. These fish were suspended about 17-19 feet around the point. I'm curious as to how to catch redears in the heat of summer . . . if they are suspending, will they still fall for snail / clam meat, jigs & nibbles, or red wigglers? Anyone had luck with post-spawn shellcrackers, or caught them in the winter?

It's one of those times I'm wishing I had an underwater camera! My guess from what I've read on the various posts here is that I should focus my search on the weedy-ended cove. There are definitely tons of bluegills up in there . . . last week I caught some 8" bluegills on wigglers, but no redears; when I went on the bottom all I came up with were channel cat. There has been quite a bit of rain here over the last few weeks, & the lake has risen 8-10 feet as a result, but is still clear due to a long-running drought we've been having. The lake isn't at its high-water mark, but there are some shoreline terrestrial weeds flooded, & there is a good-sized slot between shore & the inside of the weedline. The water is still cool for late May, lots of crappie in close to shore, bass biting great in a few feet of water . . . so I am thinking
that somewhere those redears are prime.

I usually make it out a couple times a week, & am itching, if you couldn't tell, to get some redears to tangle with . . . not looking for giants necessarily-- even one would get me amped at this point! Whatever advice you have for a novice will be greatly appreciated, & I will keep you posted as to how things progress.