Hi guys,
My name is Rob Milton, and I live in Georgetown, TX. I just found this forum a couple days ago and registered last nite.

It looks like this place is packed full of good information and good people. I hope to learn a lot and maybe contribute here and there...

I grew up fishing with my grandfather mostly on Lake Travis and some on Lake Austin, but haven't had much opportunity for quite a few years now.

I have been fixing up my grandfather's boat (15' LoweLine jon boat with 35hp Evinrude), and had the motor rebuilt a few weeks ago (burned up while my brother had it out a few years ago when the water pump went out on it). We just started getting it in the water, and I'm excited to get back to fishing and taking some friends who have never really fished.

We went out tonite to Lake Georgetown. The water was full of debris from the storm, and my fish finder said it was just under 73 degrees. We found a few small ones on a brush pile at about 18' to 20'. Just caught a couple crappie in the 10" - 12" range. One on the bottom, and one at about 12' to 14'.

I'd love to get my friends into some crappie. We live about equal distance from Lake Granger and Stillhouse. Years ago I fished Granger, and I know it's always been a popular crappie lake. But I've heard from some people that you can do well fishing crappie at Stillhouse.

What would be our best chance of catching a bunch of decent crappie? Granger or Stillhouse? Where do we look? Depth? General locations? And what bait/tackle is working?

Sorry for such a long message. But I'm anxious to meet you guys and hear your thoughts.

Rob

Welcome to the forum. Can't help you with stillhouse, but I can give you a little info on Granger. The crappie should be finishing up spawning, although you can probably still catch some shallow. I mean shallow 10" to 3ft. Very soon or probably starting now, they will be moving out onto the brushpiles. Any brushpile between 6ft to 13ft will hold lots of crappie. You will catch many small ones, but have to keep moving from pile to pile to gather a mess of keepers. Maribou jigs 1/32 - 1/16 chart. color or minnows will do the job. Some people also fish the standing timber at the mouth of the river and claim a better keeper ratio in that area. Hope this helps. BTW if you put in at Fox park, the shorlines have many easy to find B-piles in 8ft to 12ft of water.

Ram357,
Welcome to the TFF the best place to talk fishing in the USA.
Sorry I can't help on the Central Texas lakes, but there are several here that can and I'm sure will...
Let me invite you to visit my web site for some quality hand tied jigs...
Regular feather, maribou, and hair jigs are available.
Ounce again welcome and thanks for your visit to my web site....
Matthew
aka JIGUM

Welcome aboard!

Follow Crappie_Condo excellent information and you will do fine on Granger. Find the structure is the start to finding the crappie. It will take time to build experience and confidence on Granger. Nothing fancy is needed, just electronics to find the brush and time.

The fellow Belton fishing brothers will chime in on Stillhouse/Belton lake crappie.

Thanks for the welcomes... and for the input.

Crappie_Condo and Sabot... thanks for the info on Granger. I think I may head out there this evening or tomorrow and scope things out.

Matthew... I'll be sure to take a look at your web site. Hand tied... now that brings out the fly fisherman in me. Spent 25 years going to Colorado in the summer fishing dry flies.

Thanks again, guys. And I look forward to some of the Belton guys with info on Stillhouse...

If you see a red Lund, say "Hi". It most likely will be me. I will assist in any way possible. Heck, I may even give you a fish or two!

welcome aboard

welcome to the TFF. Lots of good info here!

Welcome to the forum Ram... and good luck this weekend!!!

Welcome to the forum as well. Avoid the skiers and you'll find lots of fish in unlikely places has been my experience.

Welcome to TFF

Welcome Ram, glad to have you aboard.

Thank you all for the nice welcome...

I'm enjoying reading the posts throughout the forum. Looks like a great place to learn...

Ended up working at our church this evening so headed to Granger tomorrow. Mostly gonna scope out the lake for future trips, but no doubt we'll drop a line in the water here and there. I'll let you know how it goes...

And I'll watch for that red Lund, Sabot...

Thanks again guys...

As for Stillhouse Hollow, this would be the time to start fishing drop offs. Stillhouse has lots of structure and a very good place to fish crappie or whites. This time last year we fished in 38-39 ft on the drop offs and in most cases they were suspended around 20'.. Get some of Matt's jigum jigs, minnow and learn the lake.. If you plan on fishing Stillhouse feel free to PM me for some info...

YEP, I would definitely take F4F's invite seriously. They have a post on here called the Belton Bunch. It's just a short distance further that Stillhouse.

Stillhouse is an awesome lake, but very clear which makes it quite a challenge to fish. I understand that on clear water impoundments like Stillhouse (which is the clearest I've seen on average) it's harder to sneak up on them. So, get to know that lake during the day and go out at night with a light to blind them, hide your profile, and attract them to you with those herds of bait fish around your boat.

I have yet to get back to Stillhouse 'cause I still have not fished out Travis or Buch. The most consistent crappie fishing for me in my area has been Travis and the biggest challenge for me is Buch.

I caught one just under 17" on Buch by accident trolling a crank bait. Travis has loads of 14"s on hand right now...or at least before this last bout of rains. We'll have to see how the last round of rains had changed the waterscape.

Welcome to TFF...lots of good and great people on here with loads of expert advise. If the search engine is working now (they went thru rounds of software updates but it seems much more stable now), you can search specific topics to see what people had to say about it.

I know my fishing has improved 1000 percent from reading and posting here. But, it's been a while since I have run into a horde of top water hungry stripers....which is no fault of this web site.

Good Luck and Tight Lines!!!

R