went to Pineview today. the waters really low..no bites or nothing..my question is, whats the best way to find Crappies if the water so low…plus i’ll be fishin from the shore…tigers and smallies i’m not worried about, cause i can find em…all and all i had fun walking around on the sand and rocks..lol
About the only time to get crappies near shore is during the spring spawn. After that they head out in the main lake and often suspend in deep water. Not unusual to find schools of crappies 30 feet deep in 50 feet of water. And, very soon, as the water keeps dropping and cooling, they will be right on the bottom in the deep water near the dam.
Without a boat or tube…and good sonar…you will be limited in your crappie fishing. Not much going on with the other species either. Really surprising that the perch have been missing in action this year. They were active all summer two years ago. But, like most other species, they run in cycles.
tube dude is right . there is no reason to go to there now.
Thanks TD…
I have found the perch!!! Strange as it my seem I was hitting them on the south side with a worm and a carolina rig. Years past I could get them three feet from shore. Tried most of the day along the beach and nothing. So I thought I would see if I could catch a cat on the bottom with worm and blamm started getting many perch..most small but a few was good. The trick was that I had to cast out as far as I could..The perch would either hit the worm on the fall or they was way down at the bottom.
Give it a try..
Good on ya. This time of year you never know where you will find any of the fish species in Pineview. Although perch are mostly known to be bottom huggers they can suspend anywhere in the water column…just like crappies. They seek out areas where the water temp and chemistry are the way they like it…and maybe some food too…then they stay until conditions change. That could be a week…or completely different tomorrow.
That’s why I prefer to go out in my tube, with sonar, so that I can get a read on where the fish are holding. I don’t always catch them, once I find them, but it is for sure you “can’t catch them where they ain’t”.
I usually start hitting the deep water in the narrows after the first of October. That is the deepest spot on the lake and if everything comes together you can catch a grundle of fish vertical jigging in over 50 feet of water.
In the “olden days”, several of us rigged with slip bobbers and over 20 feet of leader below the bobber. We fished off the bank and did not have sonar. But, once we found the “zone”, everybody rigged the same depth and we got a bunch.
Thanks for the report.