Lake Whitney is on fire. I've gone down there the last few afternoons and the jig bite is the best I've seen on any of the lakes I've been fishing lately. There is bait fish everywhere, and the crappie are incredibly healthy. I've been finding fish on submerged timber down around the island on the south end, and slowly working my way north from there. I'm hitting any piece of timber I can find, and dropping jigs on a few brush piles along the way. I have been so pleased with this lake that it's now being added to my bodies of water that I guide on. Here's what we did yesterday for success:


Water temp: 88-90 degrees
Water color: lightly stained
Lake depth: About 5.5-6ft low
Best Depth: 6-12ft - seeing a thermocline in a lot of areas around 17-20ft
Rod of choice: 10'6" Pro Mag G Rod
Reel: Pflueger President Spinning Reel spooled with Mr. Crappie hi-vis mono
Best Technique: Slip bobber pitched around target or pitching jig out and letting it fall towards target
Best JIg: Ghost Minnow or Orange Crush Thump Chubbies from www.constantpursuitoutfitters.com


We started our trip around 3pm yesterday, and pulled eight keepers off our first stop. I started with a natural colored presentation, as there were millions of small baby shad swimming around and I had a lot of competition. Plus, the water was more clear then what I'm accustomed to and I didn't want the fish getting picky. A strong ESE wind picked up around 4:30, so we tucked into the bank and just kept idling along, fishing anything we could see with the naked eye or on the graph. As the sun continued to drop, I switched over to a bait with a little more contrast so they could see it better (plus I just wanted to experiment with a killer looking fall color) and the fish didn't seem to mind.

All in all, we split thirty keepers up for both of our freezers, and threw back another 20-30 legal fish. We probably had 8-10 undersized fish. Two things that really impressed me were how fat the fish were, and how aggressively they were hitting a jig. I haven't been on a jig bite like this since probably mid to late June. As you can tell by the tailgate pic, Greg and myself had some fun. If you can't have fun on the water, you're doing it wrong.

Great report, thanks for sharing!

Sweet! Great report- looks like you guys had a blast.

only a little over 90 minutes from Dallas. I may have to hit Whitney soon

Slabs...... Nice tips.....

WTG! Nice slabs

Nice job Laner!

Nice Crappies!!

WTG Lane!

Solid post and fish. Good job.

If they get any bigger, your going to have to get a wider cutting board. Sweet!

Thanks for the report, Laner. Had good luck there last year in September. Was going back a week later, then the lake flooded. Need to go back and try it out.

Great post. Whitney is getting back to the good old days.

Outstanding !!