Find the shad, find the crappie!

I went back to one of my favorite lakes here in central N.C. on Sunday. It took a little while (2+ hours) to crack the code to get the crappie to bite. They were under the schools of shad in 17-23 feet of water with the crappie holding around 10-12 feet. They wouldn't hit a crankbait if I was pulling it too fast, but if I stayed in the .75 mph to 1.25 mph range, they'd hit sometimes. The bigger fish were active early, but once the sun got overhead, dinks was all I caught. No fish bigger than 14 inches with 5 over 13 inches. All caught on Flicker Shad 7cm. Still great fun on a pretty Fall Day. There was almost too many shad for them to eat.

Had a Bald Eagle fly right over me close, but he was faster than I could break out the camera.

Jim

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Always fun figuring them out. Good job stickin with it.

A couple nice ones, sounds like a fun day !

Nice fish! I haven't tried to pull cranks for crappie yet. I'm still having to much fun jigging and slip corking. That and I might be to cheap to lose a $4 bait.

Great report and some really nice crappie you got there. Especially the last picture! :)

that little one sure had its eye on a BIG meal .....to funny
congrats on a nice trip my friend

Good job I've been having a heck of a time lately in NC piedmont. This time of year is always tuff it seems, fish everywhere, bait everywhere, either don't find the fish or they don't want to bite I can't tell which scenario I'm in :P

Congrats and very nice report. Appreciate it.