Hutchy....you locate them with electronics...

Or my method ...drill and hope ??

If you don’t already, you should be a guide!

Electronics only to seal the deal, they are always in the same basin.

Thousands. And I do my best to only fish it when the ice is sketchy so I dont burn the spot by someone seeing me

Nah. If you make something you love into something you have to do for money, it changes it.

Plus, even though its a big area and theres lots of fish, crappie can be cleaned out fast if the wrong people figure it out..

I take two-three limits a year from this spot. And id like to keep being able to do that.

Im not giving that up for a few hundred bucks

I thought the white outline was you drawing chalk outlines at the crime scene.

Thats funny!

Nice haul there

I think it would be fun to ice fish but there is never enough ice around here

Nice bunch of fish. Hear a lot about tungsten jigs for crappie and perch... Why are they the rage over lead?

Congratulations on some nice slabs.

WS

Ice is pretty essential

You can catch exactly the same fish with lead jigheads. Its mostly hype.

However, a few positives:

Some say they show up better on sonar. I dont see a difference, as that has more to do with head shape, but its an argument.

Denser than lead, so they have more weight in a smaller package. For pan fish that often want very small profiles, this can help get the bait down deep, yet not have a huge jighead. I use tungsten football heads for laker too. Smaller profile and more weight means they drop a bit quicker in the water also, which is a benefit for laker. We are talking small percentages of difference though. Again, lead works just fine still.

Its the new "thing". Lead tackle is Soooooooo outdated and boring. Besides, if the internet influencers dont hype them up as the latest and greatest, how would tackle shops convince anglers to spend $9.00 on a single jig head? Tungsten jigheads are the 6.5 creedmoor of the fishing world imo

They are of course, non toxic. I doubt a few jigheads are going to make a difference, but here we are.

That's a nice mess Hutchy.

I've brought home a few crappie in the past and my usually non wild fish eating girlfriend tried some that I cooked up asked when I had time to go to the store to buy fresh fish ?

We just finished supper and my answer was simple my store was Fort Peck Lake the day before , now she tells me I need to go fishing more often !

Fish fry at you're place ha ha thank you for sharing with us !

Crappie are the best tasting in my opinion. Also, they are young for the size you keep them at, so fewer contaminants bioaccumulate in the meat!

That sounds reasonable me , smaller walleyes in the 12"- 16" size are a close 2 nd place .

I'm not brave enough to try the ice on either the ponds or lakes just yet we've some cold weather just not cold enough long enough to change my mind on going ice fishing just yet .

Great cstch

Yup.


And no fish is worth your life. Or a really cold, wet day either