As you all here in Kansas know, the weather the past few months has been rather odd. It has been rather cool for April and May with a few days getting warm here and there. The water temp was up to 70 one day in April and then plummeted back down to 62 degrees the following day. No doubt the fish are as confused as I am. Last week the crappie started slamming everything that I tossed in the water. It did not matter what color the jig was, they were all over it. Every sandy flat that was 11' to 5' deep was covered with crappie. My Dad came up from OK as well as some other friends, my boat was full and the live well was loaded with crappie, everyone caught their limit 4 days straight. We were hooking crappie every single cast and it was great fun. Then on Friday, the crappie were gone, they just disappeared. Funny thing is, I have friends that were fishing other lakes in the area and they had the same experience. 4 days of absolute crappie bliss and then poof, they disappeared. I have looked deep, looked shallow, looked in the trees and stumps, looked for them on the rocks, as well as sand flats and mud flats but they have vanished. This same thing has happened year after year but in past years, the crappie stick around for 3 weeks but not this year, 4 days was all we got. Did any of you see a change in the pattern on the lakes you fish this year?

 Water temp is up now so I will stop looking for crappie until this fall and winter. They will start schooling up tight in late September and the fishing frenzy will continue into January, I love cold weather crappie fishing. Until then, I will go after bass, saugeye, and break out the heavy gear and hunt big flatheads. The sunfish are in the shallows and the big cats will be in 3' of water or less every night so they will be easy targets. I had 50lb braided line broke by a couple of monsters last year so I upgraded to 80lb braid on my best big cat rods. I also decided to buy some new reels, I ordered some Cabela's Salt Striker reels with baitfeeder. I had a couple of Shimano and Okuma reels that were beginning to show some signs of wear and tear and the Salt Striker reels looked like they may be a good option so I will find out how they hold up when a 60lb+ flathead starts ripping line of the reel and the drag is screaming. If they work well, I'll post something about it and maybe it will be useful information to some of you other guys that hunt big cats.

Trace

Westwood KS 66205

tbgifted,,, so close but so far away. When the crappies seem to dissappear after/during spawn, look for them in spawning depths,,,,'AWAY' from the bank. Slow trolling minners on jigs in 5 to 9ft just about 2 ft down will put you back in them. I'll put out the 'long' poles in racks and use the trolling motor to move ever so slow around where they have been. You'll catch mostly females doing this too. It's an old tourney trick that I have done for years. Now about summertime crappies. I think it is one of the best times to target big,,,,did I say "BIG" crappies. Fish a lake with standing timber and so shallow you'll think I'm nuts but,,,, that's where they will be. Those big slabs are just like big bass. They wanna own their spot and since they are ambush feeders, the trees are the place to look. Remember this,,, where are the shad???? NOT DEEP!!! Done a show for 'Midwest Crappies' 2 years ago at Pomona Lake, KS. Never fished deeper than 8ft and as shallow as 2ft. Went thru 10 doz. minners in just 4 hours. O ya,,,, the day before we shot the show it was a balmy, 103 degrees. Well anyway try it,,,you'll be all alone except,,, for a white Alumacraft Bay Invader. We will both be smilin' ear to ear!!!! <*)}}}>< 

 I found the crappie. The lake I fish is the #1 ranked state in the lake for crappie density and they average from 10" to 15" with a few over 16" although I have thrown back 2 that were well over 16" and one might have been the new state record but I just could not bring myself to put that big sucker in the livewell. That fish is still swimming the lake. This lake has hardly any cover and no submerged cover. About 15 yrs ago, the lake was still overseen by the city rather than the state and many people complained about loosing lures in the trees so the city went in and cleaned out all the brush ot so the story goes. I was told this by some of the older guys that have lived here a lot longer than I have and if anyone knows for sure what happened, it would be them. Cleaning out the stumps and trees was the dumbest thing that ever happened but it did not seem to stop the crappie from producing.

 Anyway, I was hitting some scattered fish on the fish finder in 15ft of water and I figuired it could be the saugeye so I tied on a blade bait that I make and started dragging it about a foot off the bottom. It did not take me long to figure out that those scattered fish were not saugeye but crappie. My daughter was fishing with my Son and I and she is not the best fisherman but she can watch pick up a rod when something hits it while we troll so I set rods in rod holders across the back of the boat with blade baits and spoons. We started trolling and within 3 hours had 150 fish in the live well. The bottom of the lake is nothing but mud, no brush, stumps, nothing, it is a barren waste land but the crappie were there. The blades spoons out preformed the blade baits as far as numbers go but the blade baits where putting the big ones in the boat. For those that want big ones, try trolling with a blade bait, the big ones really seemed to like them.

Trace