Cranberry Marsh Panfish

tlambert

tlambert

PMA Member
Got up to my dad's cranberry marsh this past weekend to help him change out the undercarriage on a dozer. Lucky for me the parts didn't show on time so we got to get some icefishing in while we waited.
After hand drilling 20 some holes on our lower pond and not finding a fish, we gave up on the day. Saturday we went up on to our upper pond and got into the panfish right away. Here are a couple pics of some of the decent size ones. We didn't keep anything so I don't have any pics of piles of fish, but between the two of us, we probably caught near 40 in 2hours. There were some dinks in the batch too though.
Couldn't find the crappies that I know are in there. I've caught them in the 14-15" range in years past and on spinnerbaits in the summer. I need to get a vexilar so I know when we're on fish.
Maybe some of you can give me some hints on tactics for crappies through the ice. Our water is anywhere from 2' to 12' deep. The shallows are full of standing trees, stumps, vegetation, and brush and the deep portions are ditches without much structure.

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Not that I know diddly about fishing or but here is my thoughts. Sounds finding the crappies shouldnt be extremely tough. The marsh is only so big and there's no structure reason for them to be 1 place or another.
I would think finding the correct bait/jig combination should be the real trick.

Maybe you should change it up and go to a jigging spoon with a minnow head or a full minnow on a small jig. Color may make all the difference in the world.

Good luck.
 
Damn new fangled electronic camera doohickies... HA

Bet you will love it. They say they are really the trick for pan fishing.
 
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: tlambert</div><div class="ubbcode-body">ordered a aqua view type camera from cabelas...that should help! </div></div>

It will...now you'll be able to SEE the fish not bite /forum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/cry.gif

Seriously, you'll love the camera as long as the water clarity in the pond is decent. Most ponds don't have the clarity of larger lakes, but the ones we fish allow decent camera visibility within 5 feet or so. That's the reason I bought the Vex first...it works no matter the water clarity, and also allows you to see the entire water column. Crappies are notorious for suspending a ways up, but not always. Based on the pattern for this time of year, I'm guessing you'll find that you were on more fish than you realized, but that you had a lot of sniffers. Good luck out there!

NWBuck
 
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