Finding Summer Crappies on Large Flowage

Hi Fellas...

looking for some advice as to where to look to find summer crappies on a large river system in northern Wisconsin.

The main lake...just up stream from the dam is deep in the old river channel and then tapers to 30 - 15 feet for most of the main lake. The top of the main lake has two river channels...one east one west. This is where two rivers converged prior to the dam. THere is plenty of structure....probably 200 some cribs and rock piles in the main lake at 30 - 20 feet.

In the spring you can count on the slabs being in the shallow flats off of one of the river channels. I assume that they move to the large lake in the summer but I have not been able to find them....I few here and there but not a decient school..

I have probably checked nearly all of the cribs and rock piles this summer with my 898C SI. Not much luck. Do you think that there is just to many good places for them to hold too so they do not school up?

Should I give up on the main lake and look for structure in one of the rivers?

Appreciate any help....


Hartwa

FWIW the lake I fish has steep sides and a channel that starts at 10' and eventually gets to 50'. When the temps start to climb we head for the deep water. We spider rig and fish 10'-15' down. Suspended fish is what we mainly catch.

Hartwa,

This year I have spent less time trying to find the schools and more time concentraiting on the ones that want to bite. You cover way more ground but it has also put alot more fish in the boat. Like Dwaw said, we look for suspended fish on the fish finder and go from there. Pushing jigs, pulling jigs, and casting has all been good. Just covering ground. We find a few, we go back over that area. You will be surpised how many times you run over an area, catch a few, then go back and catch a few but if you stay over that area you catch nothing.

Thanks to both of you for the help.... I think that you are right. I am expecting to find large schools stacked up on structure and the problem with that is that there is so much structure on this lake that I will never see large numbers in any one spot.

I went out on Friday and set the follow the contour at a 30' line. Spider rigged 3 poles and just enjoyed the ride with my 8 year old girl and a few beers. No fish but relaxing all the same.

Two trips out of my last 3 trips both of my HB units went out, so we were fishing blind and spider rigging deep water, so as not to get snagged up, we caught 50 and 40 just movin' around and doubling back.

At Ky lake during the warm weather many fellas will pull crankbaits called c55http://www.amazon.com/wLure-Crankbait-Fishing-Lure-C55X1/dp/B00FQ7R7GC

Use your depth finder to see where the fish are holding (depth) and troll the ledges.

Funny how that works dwaw.

I remember not ever having a fish finder and we still found them. If I recall, we did a ton of drift fishing and moving around then too.

I guess sometimes it is better to shut them off and use our instincts!

Just got back from fishing. My FF's worked for 1 1/2 hrs then shut down. We caught 45, probably 30 or more w/o the FF's. Once we found them, we kept circling around. We were getting 2 and 3 at a time. Crazy. The FF's started working after 2 1/2 hrs and some poking around.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dwaw

Just got back from fishing. My FF's worked for 1 1/2 hrs then shut down. We caught 45, probably 30 or more w/o the FF's. Once we found them, we kept circling around. We were getting 2 and 3 at a time. Crazy. The FF's started working after 2 1/2 hrs and some poking around.

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Use any marker buoys once you hit them?

I have a couple but really don't use them. In today's case they were hold up between a boat dock and a large rock outcropping, a distance of roughly 100 yds in water ranging from 15 to 30 feet if memory serves.