yesterday we were fishing 1/16 oz and 1/8th oz feather jigs and getting a few bites, then when I switched to a larger bait, it was alot more action. that yum wooley beaver tail was very attractive to some very healthy fish. The big slob on top of the ice chest locked up my American angler fillet knife, think it broke a gear, I hope I can fix it.
thats a quarter next to the shad that they were eating. even the undersized 8 inch throw backs were hitting the bigger bait.

anybody have a theory on the red lips many crappie are wearing this time of year?

Nice work...you've got em dialed in for sure

females? LOL

Nice fish. Good job.

Great Post thanks for sharing!

I don't have a theory on the red lips, but don't necessarily believe the match the hatch theory.

Darrell and I fished Waco yesterday and we fished with baits anywhere from 3 inch plastics to 1/32 oz.feather jigs, AKA Dan's Jigs.
We caught more fish with the smaller baits and still managed some good sized crappie. Not as big as that one monster you had, but we did catch some that would go 1.25 pounds.

I believe that sometimes you can make a fish bite better by using small baits.
Presentation, along with powerbaits, will get ya bit with smaller baits, when they wont touch a large bait.
Most of the time crappie are a lazy fish, but if you put it right in front of them as I just described, they usually can't resist. Most of the fish we caught were what I call "hangers", very light bite if any, just had to raise up on pole to feel them. At least 40 of them could not resist the temptation yesterday!

BTW, nice catch Steve!

I have got some very good fish on tiny jigs as well, a 64th oz with hardly anything on it. there are many variables I guess,. different schools of crappie and different schools of bait of different sizes, so it may be a very dynamic pattern,. My podna was fishing right next to me with a 1/16 oz feather jig, and just couldnt buy a bite, but I was sticking them pretty good with the 3 inch bait. . Earlier in the day we were both using a 1/16 oz chart jig, with mediocre results, and some smaller fish. so there can be many variables. Ive seen in the spring, when the shad hatch, they wouldnt hit anything but a tiny jig, like a slab bandit mini. so what im going to try and keep in mind, is to not only try different colors, and presentations, but different profiles as well.
I believe this time of year, they can afford to be a little more picky, especially with the amount of baitfish on the lake right now.

Cause they've been on ice.

good guess but Ive caught them right out of the lake like that with the lipstick., damned covergirls.. haha