Yesterday morning was very nice and calm so I grabbed my minnows and jigs and headed out and fished the standing timber in about 18 to 20 ft of water. The early morning was very pleasent but the fish weren't hitting until about 8:30 am. From 8:30 till 10:am I boated about 20 keepers. Most of the fish were smallish 10 to 13 inches and around noon culled these out and cleaned 8 very nice fish. Most of the fish were suspended in about 10 ft of water and the bite was very light.

Of coarse I let a Monster Crappie get away, got em to the top of the water and the hook came out (Dang!). Fish get away all the time but this one was my largest I've hung this year.

About 1:30 PM, storm front came in high wind and rain, water today is stained but I'll bet the fishing will be back by this weekend.... LOL

nice catch u had, but u know the big ones always seem to get away....lol

Sory about the big one!!! Seems to happen all the time....

The timber bite is almost always better once the sun gets up.

Good report, looking forward to getting down there next month for the CAT tournament.

We fished RC a couple times and found a bunch of small ones. This like CC indicates a very good spawn. Would I be correct in predicting great crappie fishing in those 2 lakes in the next 2 or 3 years? Or is this my imagination?

Being relatively new to the crappie world I would like to get the input from the more experienced fishermen.

Great! another storm system coming in, and the water hasn't cleaned up from the last storm. Guess I shouldn't complain (to much). I still remember the pain of watching the lake dropping 12 feet during the drought and wondering if the water will ever come back. Those were dark days.

Yes, I agree with you Jerry the bite seems to be much better latter in the day. But this year the wind has been a facter. The wind has been pretty fresh during most of the daylight hours. I tried fishing last week in the late evening but couldn't find a crappie. There has been large schools of feeding White Bass passing through my fishing area during that time and I wonder if it has something to do with the crappie bite. (probably not)

The crappie bite is so very light too, their are times when I have a fish on and don't realize it (this happen with the large crappie that got away). I'm using my new 8 ft crappie rod with the lively tip and power pro line to get an edge on those light bites. I'm not sure if the Power Pro line is that much help but that lively rod tip has improved my catch ratio alot.

Good Luck on you trip to RC, this isn't the easiest lake to catch large numbers of crappie on, but the ratio to large to small is pretty good. And as the summer goes on the timber fishing should get better.

Tight Lines

Bubblehead can believe I havent ran into you on the lake been on the water all week you are right the bite was on right before the storm had 21 keepers that day probably caught 40 to get them .The bite is so light you didnt swingem in they just sucked it in and and you had weight on your line .I had to drag the jig on the bottom bump some timber and thump set the hook twice and put the rod tip in the water so they didnt jump and get off .Today was alot better fished new water at least 21ft and they were on the bottom .Came home for the weekend going back to rc sun night for another week .Send me a pm and we can get together if you want

Mr Moore,
I generally fish the other end of the lake down near Midway on Richland Creek. Since I've retired and have moved to the lake my life hasn't been my own since. With 6 grandkids and a wife that has become my boss I have no idea what I'm going to be doing the next day. I have spent all this week at the Freestone County Fair with the kids and their projects. So I never plan when I'm going fishing, I just go when I have a chance to go, and when conditions are good.

Please always stay in touch and your comments are always welcome. I enjoy your RC reports and consider you a neighbor and I'm sure in time our paths will cross and the crappie will be in trouble then...

Are you fishing in the big lake around P/island, or around the bridge?
steve

Steve I usally fish the south side of the lake to stay out of the wind .I havent gone past midway many times .The lake is so different now that it has water in it .The pattern is slowly taking shape .The light bite last week was really strange I finally got to where I set the hook twice to stay hooked up .Do you have any idea what species the fry that are around all the trees are?I hope they aint sand bass

I can remember the days you couldnt get under the 287 bridge because of so many boats tied up crappie fishing, i miss those days!!!

Well all I can say is me and Cecil were humbled to say the least on Saturday. We put in at South Port and headed West toward the timbers. On the lake at 8:30 am and fished until 12. Had probally 15 fish, one out of the 15 we did not have to measure, all the rest were short. Majority of the fish we caught was line watching, no real hard thumps. You saw your line slack-up set the hook. Fishing in 20 to 27' of water fish were suspended at 15' to 20'.

Caught quite a few of them yellow bellies, and saw the sandies on top quite few times. Even the sandies were not the RC quailty of past. Probablly just us lol.

But I still love that lake. Saw one other boat fishing in the vicinity of us in the timbers. That's not shabby for a saturday.

Good-luck

Marc

Crappie were slow at RC Friday evening, so we went in search of the Sandies. Caught 50 really nice ones in a matter of 2 hours. Had-em cleaned and bagged by dark. We were tired and thirsty so we sat down, and drank a few cold ones. It was a good day.