Caught about 20 fish today including about 15 "keeper" crappie (all catch and release). The best crappie were pushing 14". Water temp was between 55 to 58. (59 where the effluence was flowing out, ewe). The crappie on the bottom right had a weird growth over it's eye.


I also spotted a buck. Took some cool video, here is a still.

AWESOME! Thanks for sharing - cool pics...

Looks like a good day. Certainly nice weather to be up in the creeks. Thanks for sharing the pics.

Tony, you going out in the am? I'm thinking about hitting rc

very nice day for sure and the buck is just a bonus

Thanks for the offer Adrian, but I'm working today (lunch break now). You have any time avail Monday?

Thanks for the compliments. Yes, the weather (warm and windy) made the creek a good choice. My only regret was not trying harder for LMB, since I know the crappie will bite all winter.

BTW, the eyeball growth on one of the crappie I caught still makes me wonder. Here is a better pick. Would you eat this fish? I was glad I wasn't keeping any after seeing this, and then later observing the soapy effluence from the sewage plan that seemed to repell the fish upstream/downstream of it in either direction.

If you send that pic to the TPW fish hatchery at Athens they would probably make an educated guess on what that might be.

Crappie move around quite a bit throughout the year. That same fish might be caught next week a mile away. And the ones you catch at the dam might have been at the outlet last week.

Looks like a good trip though. Thanks for sharing.

To me it looks like he got hooked through the eye and his eye ball popped, someone else released him and you caught him later looking like this. It might be some kind of infection form the incident. I would prolly toss him back.

Tony is that the creek by me or another one? I'm free on Mondays, hit me up and let's go.

Carver, I agree, those fish undoubtedly travel a lot. I've eaten plenty out of there too and they taste just fine :-)
h4rdcore, yep, I am sure you are right. The eye is probably covered by the fish equivalent of a scab. I've seen white blotches like that on other injured parts of crappie.

Rob, I'll PM you.

earwig