Fall crappie action usually really good

It’s no secret we have a long winter up here in Sunset Country. So like many anglers, I try to keep the boat wet as long as the weather permits.
We still have at least a few weeks of open water left before things start to freeze up—and the fall season offers some of the best fishing of the year for several species.
Since all of the bass tournaments are finished, it really allows me a lot more time to focus on fishing for other species.
While I do fish for walleye, pike, musky, crappie, and lake trout, as well as a few other species during the summer, my main focus usually is on bass and getting ready for the next tournament, wherever that might be.
Fall crappie fishing has been a tradition for me since I was a little kid because these tasty panfish congregate in predictable locations and usually are in an active mood, so the fishing can be really good.
In general, crappies are tough to catch during the summer month across our part the world. We certainly see incidental catches, and there are a few areas where they consistently show up, but my feeling is that a lot of these fish suspend around deep weeds, where they are hard to see on our electronics, and just hide out.
In the fall, they typically move to deep holes or basins in the bays or lakes that they live in, and they will spend the winter in these locations.
Since crappies are notorious for congregating into large schools, they usually are easy to locate on our electronics, so it becomes a game of looking for the fish on the screen and then catching them.
Many times they like to hang out slightly above the bottom, which helps anglers spot them on the screen more easily than if they were hugging the bottom like walleyes typically do.
Once you locate some crappies, catching them is the easy part. Despite being smaller in size, they like to eat. Since you’re going to be fishing deeper water, usually from 20-35 feet, you want small profile jigs or spoons that are compact yet heavy enough to get down in the deeper water.
These are 1/8- or 3/16-oz. jigs for me. If you use light line like four- or six-pound test, then they get down there pretty quick, especially if it’s ultra thin braided line.
It’s been years since I have used live bait or meat for crappies, even though they do like small minnows tipped on a jig. I generally just tip my small jigs with some sort of small soft plastic body, like a three-inch Northland Smelt Minnow.
I usually bite a little bit off the head of the plastic just to shorten it up a little bit.
Small spoons or Puppet Minnow jigs, tipped with some small, scented soft plastic maggots or waxies, are really good, as well. It’s really much more important to find the fish rather than worry about your lure.
The other benefit to finding crappies at this time of year is that the same locations usually are going to be good all winter long. So you can do your ice-fishing homework now and have a good idea of where to drill holes this winter.
Be sure to enjoy these last few weeks in the boat if you get the chance to get out there!