Something I've noticed over the last two years is that crappie seem to focus more on horizontal structure vs vertical structure in the fall. Is this unique to my lake or is this a common pattern ?

I have brush piles and laydowns marked all over my lake at various depths. I occasionally fish those laydowns during the summer but they aren't very productive. For the last 2 or 3 weeks those laydowns are on fire and I'm also starting to find pockets of fish staging on slopes. Same thing happened last fall. Last year I started noticing small schools of crappie on slopes but spread out over the bottom (kind of like sandbass do year round) that aren't on any visible structure. This year I'm seeing the same thing so I'm assuming this is a normal fall pattern.

Here's an example of a of a small school (I caught 5 nice sized keepers from this) that don't appear to be on any brush. I think a lot of people would miss this because it's at least 30 ft away from the nearest brush pile:




Side note ... I had a 3 day weekend and already posted my Sunday report but I'll supplement that with the other 2 days. Water temps ranged from 72 (at sunrise) - 75 degrees. All fish caught on a 1/32 white/chart hair jig

Saturday 10/8/22 -- Caught 15 in 1:43
Got a very late start (10am) because I had to pick my boat up from temporary storage and launch it by myself.
Fished spots that were on the way from the boat ramp to my house. These are all piles on main lake points, most of them are deeper 16 FOW - 20 FOW. Managed to catch a decent amount of fish but a lot of them were either under or barely keepers. Normally I wouldn't target this area this time of year but it was on my way so I tried it.

Sunday 10/9/22 -- Caught 30 in 1:44
This was the best day for numbers but the quality wasn't as good as Monday. Still had 24 keepers but caught 6 unders or near unders. I've already posted this report and pictures in another thread. Caught most of the fish in 10 - 12 FOW, but also caught a few in 16 FOW on a slope.

Monday 10/10/22 -- Caught 26 in 2:38
This day I focused only on laydowns and slopes that held fish last fall . Pace of catching was a bit slower than Sunday because I covered a lot of water but most of these fish were really nice slabs. Nothing huge but made for some really nice fillets. Most of these fish were caught in 10 - 12 FOW on laydowns.

I'm not sure about laydowns, but ledges/slopes is a definite fall pattern on some other lakes. Nice report.

Very nice! As mentioned above, the crappie really do a lot of sitting on ledges and drops this time of year. I have found this to be a sign on my lakes that they are about to go deep for the winter. I typically have found crappie in the fall to really like vertical cover and will get really shallow on it. This is more the case once it really cools off. If the water isn't very deep, they will hang towards the bottom. If the water is pretty deep, they will suspend up shallow I have found.

I have noticed on my lake that a horizontal branch/tree is the juice for crappie.

I found a very similar structure last friday,, a drop off in 13 feet. that transitioned into a ledge that ran into 6 feet. crappie were stacked on top of the ledge, with no brush. we dragged jigs along the ledge and caught several crappie.. the spot looks like a push point for larger gamefish to run baitfish against. the crappie seem to just hang out there, letting the white bass and largemouth do all of the work, and they capitalize on this
while we were fishing it, a large school of white bass had pushed a school of shad right up to where we were.
I believe this type of spot will regenerated quickly, due to the geography and access to shallow and deeper water.. were going to try it again tommorow and see if there is more crappie and baitfish there. as it gets colder we will see if the crappie stay in that area and concentrate on 22 to 32 feet.
once the big cold fronts come in , I find on lakes that dont have suitable river and creek channels to go into, the crappie will stage 22 to 32 feet deep.
2 lakes I fish in wintertime, there will be small to medium sized schools of shad hanging in deep water, that averages 26 feet. there will be crappie ghosting along with these schools and some kind of meandering around underneath them. we really didnt have much success getting those to bite..
the key to catching crappie in this situation was dragging the jig along the bottom. hopping it, jigging it, but maintaining frequent contact with the bottom. crappie will sit DIRECTLY on the bottom, looking up for straggler shad and ambush them.. many of the ones we caught actually has mud on thier bottom fins. I knew that crappie positioned themselves this way at times from watching one in an aquarium for close to a year.
they angle thier bottom gill fins outward slightly, and use them like kickstands. they use thier gill fins to circulate water thru thier gills. they are not treading water slightly off of the bottom. they are parked there.
Gamefish and baitfish have a strange co existences at times and baitfish will swim around with the gamefish like they somehow know that the gamefish is not in a feeding mode.
when I had the crappie in the aquarium, I would feed it minnows.. after the crappie ate a few, the minnows would swim right in front of the crappies nose, and move around like it wasnt even there. after the crappie had fed, if I took a minnow and put it on a hook and kept putting it in front of its face, it would turn away , and move around.. after several times it would violently bite the minnow, but not eat it.. like it didnt want it near its face.
So next time you find a school of shad hanging near a deep point, and find suspended crappie amongst them, or under them that refuse to bite, go all the way to the bottom with your jig. . as soon as you lift it up a few inches or as it hits the bottom you will likely get a bite. when you see small pods of baitfish swimming back and forth along the bottom in the forementioned depths, it is a great indicator that your going to whack em.. do not be concerned if you cannot see the fish on the bottom with your sonar, they will look like little rocks on the botttom if you can see them.. being they are not moving and are stationary, u will think there nothing there, but they are

Thanks for all the comments. I appreciate everyones willingness to share. Fishing isn't new to me, but fishing exclusively for crappie is a new learning experience for me. The last 2 years has been more fun than I ever would have imagined. I'm blessed to live on a lake and I've learned a lot from being on the lake 2 to 3 times per week but the discussions and the videos some of the guys post here has really helped accelerate my learning curve.

I used to only think of crappie fishing as just a spring time, bank fishing excursion. Targeting crappie year round has been a blast. The puzzle solving aspect is what I really enjoy, although setting the hook and a fish fry are also great rewards Maybe some day I'll learn enough to guide part time when I retire, but in the meantime I'm just enjoying the journey.

When the crappie are sitting on the bottom as mentioned above, switch to 2D sonar and they will show up on the screen.

something else to be aware of on some lakes they like to sit in short weedlines that grow on the bottom in deeper water. I think they are using it as cover to ambush. lake tradinghouse is like this.. near the dam there are short grasses that grow off the bottom in deep water. 22 to 26 feet ....the weeds are only 6 to 10 inches tall.. large schools of shad meander back and forth along the dam and from mid depths to deeper water. we have never had any luck catching crappie that are with the shad or ghosting underneath them, we locate the shad schools and drop all the way to the bottom. as soon as you lift the rod tip, if they are there u get bit.. its almost like sandbass fishing when they are on the bottom.
Its likely that when the schools of shad are being busted into by larger gamefish, higher up in the water column, some of them retreat to the weedline on the bottom to hide, and the crappie are down there waiting for them. after the crappie hiding in the weedlines feed, they then rise up off the bottom and join the rest of the school and digest thier prey. just a hunch..
I know that many folks catch crappie fishing just below schools of shad, but I havent had much luck catching them in decent numbers that way on the lakes I fish.

This is why I always say a open mind is the best thing to have when crappie fishing, all comments contain what I've seen but I can't tie it to a time of year nor condition..... Best way to stay consistent with catching crappie is see what they're doing and where they are the day you're on the water in the area of the lake you're fishing..... It's what I do....

I know this feeling. Since I broke down and got livescope crappie fishing had been a blast. I had probably caught around 100 crappie my whole life b4 Feb of last year. Im 53 now and I bet I caught over 500 since then. You would think it would get old but I have yet to find that to be the case. Finding new areas and watching the behavior is alot of fun. Also caught some great bass too thanks to LS. Big bass like to hang out around schools of crappie.