drumking, chickamauga, crappie, 3/15/09, Hal

[FishNews]

Hal and I took my boat out today for a trial run and some crappie fishing. The boat did great and we did too. We went to Grasshopper recreation area to launch and fish. We stayed in Grasshopper for a couple of hours or so and only caught 16 crappie and a tiny bass. Then we decided to run up and fish some of Dixie Boy's fish. I have never fished this area before, so we didn't know exactly what we were getting into. We got into some crappie is what we got into. We caught 41 crappie off 2 trees and 1 boatdock. Hal landed one tarp crappie and had another that was close. I had one close to a tarp, but was just a little short. Altogether, we landed 57 crappie with 28 being keepers. I kept some for my brother-in-law who requested them. He has been having health problems and hasn't been able to fish any yet. So, we kept the fish for him. 4 yellow bass, 3 lm, 1 spotted bass, and 1 bluegill made our catch total today. <br /><br />The water temp up there was 50 degrees. We caught our fish on crappie stingers, BG shads, ringer stingers and I think that was all. We tried different colors. Some were much better than others. Some wouldn't produce at all. All the fish in Grasshopper came off blowdowns and on a 6 count. The fish in the river were a little deeper. Mostly an 8 count, but under the boat dock which was sitting in 17 feet of water, we just had to make about a 12-15 foot cast and let the jig drop. The fish would hit the jig on the drop. We had several doubles on under this dock. Boy what fun we had. The weather was a little chilly. Only sprinkled on us a few times. The variable wind (lying weather man) was making some pretty good waves on the river water. It finally laid down about the time that we quit which was about 3:30. I like that area. If we have a crappie tx from grasshopper area, I know where I will be fishing.<br /><br />You might outrun me to a spot up there, Dixie, but you can't be on all those places at once. emoBig emoGeezer