i have seen for a few years what seems to be a pattern on docks that crappie like to frequent
am in hopes others might have noticed it as well
am early and later afternoon before dark seems to be the best bite on a regular basis
i would love to totally understand what i think i know
so in an effort to gather and share information
please feel free to add to or explain why ?

I can splain that in one sentence!
"Crappie loves vertical structures"
I've only fished docks once in my life & that was the trip I fished with you, I have always fished the stuff that's not visible above water.
My thinking is the non visible structure gets a lot less pressure thus it holds more crappy....
Stumps that are not visible almost always holds good fish & most folks just motor right on past them.....

One reason crappie love slips is that many slip owners brush out their slips to make a home for them.

A second reason is that the slip structure grows the algae that ends up attracting the bait fish that attract the crappie.

A third reason is the slip lights that help attract the bait fish that attract the crappie.

And although you did not ask for this, I would request that those who fish the slips from boats respect the slip owner's property.

This means don't bounce your jigs off the hulls of the slip owners' boats so your jigs drops when you want them to drop.

And don't damage slip owner property by ripping your lures out of their property when you hang the jig up in their property. Just cut your darn line and donate the jig as the price of fishing where other people are paying to keep their boats.

I've been doing fairly well late morning to early afternoon. I can't explain it why. Could be that it's usually when I fish.

I hear ya ezgoing and concur but u made me think about an ole boy at Sneaky Pete's Marina on Grapevine.
After 4-5 years of sinking 5-6 Christmas trees in my slip each yr which some of which moved over to the slip across from mine over time. So both spots were pretty productive. But back then all the slip owners just moved around until we found them. Didnt matter which slip it was open for anyone anytime. Kinda of a shared interest if u will. Of course dont damage the people's things who have done the work was all anyone asked.

Then a guy with a little boat moved in across from mine and he put up chains and a tarp and tried to block anyone from fishing around his slip and was a total jackleg about it.

One day i caught the little @@@@ fishing in someone else's slip. Talking about nerve.....

Needless to say after that I seemed to get hung on his stuff quite often and if i got hung up I just ripped tarp and even cut a chain that was in my way of landing fish....

Last winter on slips at Tawakoni, the best bite came about 30 minutes before sunup to about 9 am
Did not do well in the late afternoon/evening
Can't give current opinion, slips at tawakoni are needing more water

maybe i wasn't totally clear on what i was asking originally
i am patterning docks or trying to anyway
that we fish off of in the winter
i am trying to decide if in most cases what the most likely scenario is on the bite windows
we see a trend on several docks similar to what Kodys Papa posted
what i am wondering is do we think that most of the fish that are in the feed window
are there all day long ? or move into and out of the cover during low light conditions ?
like i said i think i have a general idea but would love to hear from other dock folks if they have the same kind of experience
and in a lot of cases we don't get to hit the prime lowest light conditions on given docks
some slips are private access only and so on and so forth limiting our ability to use them when it might make a difference
thanks in advance

I'm sorry but in my opinion you were wrong. In my opinion there is no excuse to damage somebody's property, no matter how big an A-hole they are.

But at least you were paying for a slip on the dock. The ones that do the damage at our marina fish the slips from boats and pay for nothing, including all the things they damage in retrieving their cheap lures. And yes, compared to the damage they cause, their lures are cheap.

In my marina you can only fish your slip. If you wish to fish another slip you must secure the permission of the slip holder to fish that slip. At first I did not like that as I was not used to slip holders being restricted from fishing the other slips. But after being there for 18 months and seen the damaged caused to slip property I now agree with it. By requiring you to obtain permission to fish other slip holder's slips the slip holders know who have been fishing their property.

And yes, the slip is their property since they pay the lease on the slip.

I believe the fish are there all the time. They are hiding underneath the docks until something triggers their instinct to strike.

I know the bait fish are there all the time as I can turn on the underwater light and see them, day or night. I can often also see shadows of larger fish cruising the area when I turn on the lights. I assume these are bass of some type.

I have also found that when they are not biting during the day I can remove a board in the dock walkway and often catch a crappie or two.

I have been limited to late afternoon / evening this winter, and have had few bites at LL boat docks. Our most productive trip produced 4 fish. Wish I could help more but I cannot seem to get the time to discern a pattern.
I would also like to know what others are finding.

I believe it is because baitfish eyes take longer to adjust to ambient light conditions (or lack of light), than gamefish. Its a built in mechanism, insuring gamefish will not starve.
If you have a crappie in a fish tank full of minnows, and turn the light out in the tank, the minnows will start rising to the top of the tank, and the crappie will hammer them,.

Ive noticed that lakes tend to come alive, at least for a short period at dusk and dawn. just an opinion.

Main bite has always been dark to 8 am, Then once shadows build one can pick them off slowly throughout the day until the dusk bite that may only last a few minutes. Been my reoccurring experience over the years, of course there are exceptions.

I think they stay in the slips all during the day at least and mostly because of the brush and somewhat because of the shade. They might move out at night but during the day, when they bite, it's because of some trigger that has put them in the mood to eat. Same as on days out in the lake, sometimes they bite and sometimes they don't. Sometimes there is a predictable pattern in the early morning around daylight but after that, it is some other factor that is going on as to whether they bite good or not so good. They will turn on and off like a light switch for no apparent reason. Actually, its more like one of those fluorescent screw in bulbs that starts out dim and takes a while to get full bright. But when you turn it off it goes out right now. Wish I knew what that reason was - especially the one that makes them turn on but whatever I come up with, it always gets proven wrong.

Might want to consider this thought -

I think is has a lot to do with the transition of the baitfish, no so much what the crappie want to do. I think Crappie are programed to take advantage of opportunities that happen on a consistent basis and boat docks have food sources that draw them in consistently. Shad and minnows become very active and move shallow to feed on plankton before dark and vice versa in the morning. Baitfish also feed on all kinds of things under the docks in the evening and at night, again pattern-able by gamefish. This consistent forage fish activity is pattern-able, then followed by the gamefish.

my 2 cents -