The time is coming for crappie to start spawning on the banks. I have never fly fished for them and was wondering if anybody has some advice for techniques/fly's to use/etc....

Woolly buggers.

Sinking tip? Floating?

All I have is a floating line.

Depends on how deep they are staged, but I've had good luck with a small white woolly bugger, grizzly hackle, silver hook and beadhead, fished on a clear intermediate line.

fish the shoreline and brush with a jighead under a vosi(strike indicator)vary your depth til you find the fish. Light colors of marabou or rabbit fur on jigheads-p-

So my approach to bank crappie fishing is to use a large foam double gurgler as a bobber that sometimes catches bass, and trail a bead chain eyed jig off the bend. This is is my interpretation of a fly fisherman's approach to slip bobbers for crappie. If you want to change the depth though, you have to change the tippet length on the trailing jig. I just work the gurgler, and let the jig follow that action. I've picked up both bass and crappie with this rig. The gurglers and what I call "one feather" jigs are easy to tie.

Ditto kaboboom. This is exactly what I do. I use a 1/64oz crappie jig under a foam pepper that is big enough to float with the weight. I fish it just like the guys do with slip corks.

I'll add something maybe obvious...I use a floating line with this rig

colors--white or olive or gray,or chartreuse feathers with black body chartreuse head
Type--micro jigs or smallest crappie jig you can find..
Line/Leader ---4 to 6 LB# test line leader to fly line
Float --if you want one..foam strike indicator or--foam ear plugs..slice ear plug..line in slice.tiny drop of superglue on edge ..close..slide were you need it...

Hints...Tarpon fly has some of his neardeer tiny jigs in great colors he will be glad for you to purchase --if he has any left-- that you will love...!You can reach him on this forum.

Thanks all!

When targeting spawning crappie with the fly rod, I use floating line #4-5 weight rod.

I like to use the pinch on foam indicators. And of course, a Near Deer. See below how a woolly bugger sits.



The crappie are spawning in hard sand or on something hard surfaced like a stump, tire, can, twig, rocks, ect.

If they are in the brush, like the Button Willows, there is no way to cast a fly at them. With low water this year in DFW, you will target rocks, floating tire reefs, stumps, and sandy coves. You want your fly 6 inches off the bottom. Once you find the depth they are spawning its pretty simple. Main thing u want to do is keep the fly in the strike zone as long as possible. Minimal movement. The crappie just wants other critters to stay out of the nest so they will attack anything. I have seen them bite at carp over 20 lbs to move them away from their nest. The last couple years we have targeted stumps or standing timber in 1-4 ft of water. Cast 2 ft beyond the stump and then drag the fly to each side of the stump and let it sit no more than a ft from the target. Then let it sit or give your rod small twitches. Hit all four corners of each target. The side hat is shaded most of the day, is where they will lay their eggs 90 % of the time. I just use 1/80 black/chart jigs ( Near Deers ). They lay in the water vertical unlike a clouser or WB. 2-3 weeks they should be shallow. They are in 7-12 ft right now at Lavon staging. Saw a few shallow roaming last week but this ice storm has pushed them back out.

If u catch a crappie on a stump or any other structure, hit the same spot on your way out. Chances are another male will move in and replace the one u harvested from there. Or, I am 95% sure, another one will move in by morning to the same spot.

Thanks for the details, very helpful!

This is all sage advice. I might add that if you don't fish an indicator, for me it helps to keep a mental count going in your head on what your depth your fly is sinking to. When your fly hits the water start counting one thousand one...one thousand two...etc. Once you find the fish you can likely find that same depth again by counting. In my limited experience the crappie seemed to prefer a little less current and brushier shadier areas. Stumps and logs for sure. You can just reach out with your rod and jig your fly right next to the structure and entice a bite. They don't seem to want to leave the area no matter how much noise you make. I had no idea that this was because they were nesting there, but that makes perfect sense. When I have gotten into both crappie and sand bass in a larger channel (I think they were moving upstream), the crappie seemed to be right on the bottom and the sand bass were higher in the water.

I had always previously used sinking tip of full sink line and no indicator until this year. So far I have been using an indicator and floating line. I think this is better for two main reasons

1. You can vary the depth very easily my moving the indicator. Check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m68rLxSzxPE
2. The creeks around here are tight places to cast. Roll casting floating line is about a billion times easier than sinking.