Its been a long time since we have heard anything about Sandy.
Decided mid-day yesterday that it was too nice of a day not to go fishing. Hooked up the boat and headed to Sandy River Reservoir. Hadn't fished there in almost 2 years. Place has gotten really crowed in the last few years from bass fisherman looking for the big one. It now ranks right there with Briery Creek. Too bad the crappie there run on the small side. On the water around 11:30. Caught a crappie right off as I was approaching my 1st spot. Fish brushpiles in 12-18 fow. Manage 4 small bass but no more crappie. Moved to the mouth of one of the larger creeks. Guy longlining 2 poles in front of me managed to catch a decent crappie, then I caught one. Trolled (tightlined) around this area and caught a few more over the next couple of hours. Headed back to the ramp still fishing, crossed a long point, when I got to the non-wind blown side I caught a crappie. Turned the boat around and got into them pretty good, caught over 20 in this one spot and left them biting. Too bad most were in the 7 to 9 inch range but for the day I manged to bring enough decent size fish (9-1/2 to 11 inches) home for a meal. Fish were suspended in open water in creek mouths or relating to points in 18 to 25 fow. Caught fish from 10 to 18 feet deep. Some on plain minnows but most on jigs tipped with minnows. They liked it moving slow. Missed lots more than I caught. Had a fun day. May have to make it back out there again during the week before it gets too crowded, there were about 12 or so rigs in the parking lot when I left at 4.
Its been a long time since we have heard anything about Sandy.
Fair Winds and Following Seas
Bill H. PTC USN Ret
Chesapeake, Va
Good job Roy..When you tightline what type of rig do you use? Weight on bottom(how much) or jig,minnow on bottom?
USS Intrepid CVS-11 Helicopter Squadron-3 1960-1964
When I keep my gratitude higher than my expectations I have a good day
Don I usually use a 1/2 to 3/8 oz weight about 12 to 18 inches above my jig/hook. Some on here use weights up to 2 ozs to be able to troll faster but I always move kinda slow, just ask my wife. Just started using a barrel swivel between my weight and jig/hook to cut down on line twist. In March or April I use a 1/4 oz or a single #5 or smaller split shot since I'm usually fishing water less than 7' deep.
That's a pretty lake with a great launch facility, but it doesn't have a reputation for quality fish. It also doesn't have the citations--only 4 were issued from the lake's creation through 2010. In two trips (8/08 and 9/09) I found lots of grass and a total of 4 doz. dinks. Very disappointing.
USS Intrepid CVS-11 Helicopter Squadron-3 1960-1964
When I keep my gratitude higher than my expectations I have a good day
Your right Richard it sure is a 1st class facility and doesn't give up many citation crappie but the crappie from there sure do taste good and don't have worms. You can usually count on catching fish there and being able to bring home enough of 9 to 12 inch fish for a meal once you have learned the lake. Don't know why the crappie don't get any bigger than they do. I heard they stocked the lake with crappie from Buggs so you would think if genetics had anything to do with it they would. I mainly stopped going because it gets crowded with bass hunters.
Edible size, worm-free fish are a good thing! An occasional slab would make SRR much more attractive to crappie fishermen, however. Even the biologists don't have a clue why the fishing is no better there. From their 2009 report:
The black crappie fishery continues to be an average fishery at Sandy. Most fish captured in our samples and by anglers are less than 8 inches but a few fish up to 13 inches were caught in 2008. Black crappie were second only to largemouth bass in angler effort in 2008 and while angler catch was up compared to previous years, number of crappie kept was only half what it had been. The crappie fishery at Sandy River shows no signs of drastic change so anglers will have to settle for an average crappie fishery on this particular impoundment.
"Suck it up and learn to like it" is a sad assessment of a lake this size.
Looks like a good day anyway. Beats working. Sandy is a beautiful place but the fish are small. From 1997 until 2002 I ran a United Way Crappie Fishing Tournament there. I saw thousands of crappie caught with very few over 11 inches. The first one was won from the dock by a woman, she came over about 20 minutes after it started with a nice 15 inch slab and says ”Mister, is dis one big nuff? “. I told her to hang around, she would be in the money at the end and she was, she won $300 for the heaviest ten and $50 for the biggest fish. When my company stopped the sponsorship we stopped doing it but it sure was fun. I would take off two weeks and fish all over, trying to get the ten biggest ones I could to tag. I had to tag ten, turn them loose all over the lake with a Game Warden watching. The insurance company would take the ten numbers, one would be the $10,000 winner . If a tagged fish was caught we opened an envelope with that tag number to see if it was a winner. Nine envelopes would say, sorry, your fish is not the winner. In 2001 a guy from Lynchburg caught the right one, he won $10 grand for one crappie. I have lots of picture in those old 3-1/2 discs and no way to read them, I’ll post a picture later of a 10 grand crappie when I can get a drive to see them. We gave away donated prizes until they ran out, after paying the first three places, the teams came up and picked what they wanted from the prize table, it would go down to 30 and 40 places. We had poles, tackle boxes, knives, coolers, just tons of donated stuff for prizes. I miss doing it but it was a lot of work and after we made a claim for the big winner, they doubled our premium on the tagged fish. In those five years I released 50 tagged crappie that came from all over, Buggs, Briery, local ponds, fish up to 14 inches long. I’ve only heard of one other tagged fish being caught and don’t know if it was one of mine. I found a report from 2002 that I saved with the top 20 weights, here it is.
Did any of you fish any of these tournaments?
Weight Big FishWilliams $10,000 Crappie Fishing Tournament 2002Top twenty Stringers weighed- 10 fish
5.12 1.02
4.65 .70
4.45 .59
4.27
4.18 .73
4.17 .46
4.16 .42
4.14 .49
4.14 .47
4.06 .59
4.02 .52
3.99 .49
3.98
3.98 .48
3.96 .62
3.94 .52
3.93 .75
3.93 .48
3.89 .44
3.89
160 Fishermen tried their luck but no tagged fish were caught. The 76 teams reported catching over 1400 fish. Only 48 teams weighed fish.
The Mountain Man
"ooo I got a bite !!!."
Me and my son fished that tournament back in 2001. I remember talking to the guy on the water who caught the tagged fish before he knew he won 10k. It was a very friendly tournament and one of my first times ever fishing there. I remember the takeoff being a little crazy with a couple of the smaller boats getting swamped. I only had my trolling motor and my son wanted to know why we couldn't go faster, 10hp limit. Later in the day we fished beside the guys who came in either 2nd or 3rd. We struggled to catch 10 fish while we watched them catch well over 100 in about 1-1/2 hours.. It was a good lesson for my son as they invited us to fish right beside them so my son could cast near were they were fishing and he was able to catch a few. He was 8 at the time. Too bad that was the last tournament there. We had a good time.