Texas is a big place. So you need to notice where the posts are coming from.

Winter is tough because as the water gets really cold the amount of food crappie will eat each day is less and less.

If you fish a lot of different lakes it becomes more difficult. I focus on a lake and learn all the changes in the bottom of the lake. Imagine if you took all of the water out and saw the terrain.


Since you have a boat and can catch fish during the Spawn, in mid February lookoffshore in those areas in 6' to 8' of water. The crappie will stage for a long time before they move up to Spawn. Even then there are waves of fish moving into spawning flats for a long time. Usually the bigger crappie Spawn 1st then smaller and smaller crappie will move in.
Once the Spawn is wrapping up crappie will move into deeper water (8'-10'). And will move to deeper parts of the lake to feed on Shad, mostly threadfin Shad.

Usually during the summer, I spend most of my time in 15' of water, offshore 100 yards or more. The crappie may be on the bottom or suspended at 6'. Temperature, sunlight, clarity of water, oxygen levels a lot of things come into play.
A good gps is really valuable when fishing for crappie.

I build brushpiles in different areas of the lake and different depths of water. If I haven't been on the lake in awhile. I will try different things until I start catching Crappie. Then I will target areas that have very Similar deep and water temperature.

Another hint is, the color jig you can catch crappie on when they are spawning is not the same color they want when they get offshore.