A great video from a biologist for you crappie geeks like me.
Click here
It is nearly 55 minutes long so for those who don't have the time to watch it I will give you some interesting notes I wrote down while watching it.
Average crappie lays somewhere in the neighborhood of 50,000 eggs of which only 1%-5%.
Average water temp at spawn is 59-68 degrees.
The average life span of a crappie is 4-5 years.
In a healthy body of water a crappie can reach 15" in only 3-4 years, 10" in just 2 years.
The oldest crappie the biologist had ever seen was 12 years old, but get this, it was only 6" long in a stunted body of water.
The average depth of spawn that he has seen in Oklahoma is 10'-14', yep, a lot deeper than most think.
He also explains where the black nose crappie comes from in the interview.
I found it interesting when he discussed releasing or eating a large crappie when you catch one. He said that he would keep it and eat it, which is what I choose to do, especially knowing now that the crappie is probably only 3-4 years old.
He also talked about how to handle large crappie and bass, how you do not want to hold them by the mouth and rotate them parallel to the ground as you may damage their jaw and stress the fish. So unless you are keeping the large crappie, use your other hand to support it or you may just be releasing a fish with a broken jaw.
