Macbride Crappies

Rugbystar and his daughter joined me and my son in my boat over at the Mac this evening. We fished from about 7pm til about 9pm. targeting crappies in the south arm in near shore brush piles.

Action was tepid for us. We tried about 3 areas with good structure and only managed a handful of fish.

Rugby nailed a really fat female that appeared full of eggs on a plastic grub that went 13″. We let her go to make more.

All in all, a nice evening to be out, but less action than we were hoping for. Saw a few breaking fish-probably whites/wipers.

Joe

Picked up a handfull of nice crappies in the North arm tonight. They were still in 10’+ of water.

Anybody picking up any walleyes?

Anybody been on Macbride through the rain? Any reports on how the weather has been affecting the bite?

Rugbystar and I are probably gonna fish the Mac or the Res tomorrow morning, though I think it will be a crank-a-thon in search of ol’ bucketmouth. I’ll put up a post letting you guys know how we do.

I fished the Mac Tuesday morning, early, focused on some rock piles in the north arm; specifically targeting walter, but came up empty. Foolishly, I stuck to the plan of vertical jigging these rock piles, while all around me bass and crappie were chasing baitfish. There was lots of surface activity that morning, and I’m not talking carp either.

I don’t know how I fit work in this time of year; between fishing, picking mushrooms, and maybe mowing the lawn!

Joe

I fished after work last night and the crappies had slowed down quite a bit. Picking up a lot small fish, and in deeper water. I think we need a couple days of steady warm weather and they’ll turn around. I guess I’ll hit the mushrooms for today.

We ended up fishing the Res yesterday morning. Surface water temp was 53.

We pitched cranks for a couple of hours with no luck before we bagged it.

However, at the Macbride spillway into the res, the crappie were on a tear. Guys wading and near shore were doing quite well, though it appeared there was a fair bit of sorting going on.

I think this spring, with strong shift between temps, high water, and long cold spells has made the fishing tough.

More yardwork for me today, then mushroom picking til the fishing picks up.

Joe

Hit MacBride Sat eve from 6:30 until 9:00. Tosses and pulled some cranks and jigs on the south arm over the rock piles and picked up 4 LM bass (all under 14″),1 skinny 14″ w’eye and a 21″ white bass which put up a good fight on a light action rod. I haven’t really had any good walleye action there since the year of renovation when the water levels were down (and no boats on the lake except canoes and light craft).

There were a LOT of boats out today, but I didn’t see much action going. By 2:30, a lot of people had headed home. It was slow for me again today on the north arm. Can the crappies be in the middle of the spawn? Any reports from the south arm?

I was out on the north arm for about three hours Sunday evening. I caught maybe ten 5″-ish white crappie. I agree that the slow bite everyone found was probably due to the rapid warm-up and unstable weather.

According to my Lowrance, the surface temps were about 58 degrees. If that is exactly right, then the crappie probably haven’t started spawning yet. With the forecast calling for warm temps all week, the water temps should get in to the low sixties real soon, at which point crappie go shallow and spawn.