Photo by Ron Sinfelt

By Jeff Samsel

There's something about bright sun shining on a blossoming dogwood tree that is more than most anglers can stand. The flowers call out spring, and the shining sun suggests warming waters. Those things together mean that crappie should be moving shallow, and that gets a lot of fishermen in gear.

Even folks who don't fish other times in the year get their poles out for the crappie run. It's sort of like opening day of dove season. Many anglers have a favorite spot or two that they fish every spring - a spot where they know they will find a few cooperating crappie. At least once each spring most anglers generally hit the fish fairly good.

One of the best things about crappie fishing is that targeting them doesn't require a bunch of specialized knowledge or equipment. Spring spots are obvious, as long as an angler knows that crappie like woody or rocky cover. Gear, meanwhile, can be as simple as a cane pole rigged with a float, a split shot and a small, light-wire hook and rigged with a minnow.

Making a good thing even better, many spring spots are accessible from the banks. When crappie move shallow, virtually any bridge that has a public right-of-way beneath it or around it offers a good place to fish from the bank. In addition, virtually all of the Public Fishing Access Sites maintained by the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission offer plenty of sunken cover within easy casting range of shoreline-accessible areas.

Crappie can be caught from the mountains to the coast from dozens of different waterways. Let's take a close-up look at crappie fisheries in rivers and lakes throughout the state, focusing on waters that promise to serve up the best action this year in the mountains, the Piedmont and the Coastal Plain.

"Crappie aren't a primary fish species on any of our mountain lakes," said David Yow, western North Carolina fisheries research coordinator for the NCWRC. "The lakes typically have poor structure, especially in terms of the vertical structure that crappie prefer."

Most mountain lakes don't have a lot of brush or flooded trees in shallow water. Beyond limiting habitat, that scarcity of wood can make the fish-finding process tough for fishermen. Serious crappie fishermen commonly sink their own trees, and they guard the locations of their favorite brushpiles carefully. However, in ultra-clear water and lakes that get drawn down every winter, it's tough to keep good crappie cover hidden.

On a good note, last year's high water during spring may have resulted in good spawning and recruitment, Yow said. It was too early to assess that for certain when this issue went to press, but good recruitment appeared to have occurred. That would not affect this year's fishing, which may be a bit down overall from several low-water years, but two springs from now, it could provide a real boon.

Fontana Lake fits the classic mountain scenario perfectly. Crappie habitat is quite limited and only a modest number of anglers seriously target crappie. However, those anglers who know the whereabouts of good trees at modest depths in Fontana's creek arms often fare extremely well. In addition to treetops, good areas to work for crappie on Fontana include bridge pilings and rows of stumps atop major points.

"Lunker lodges" (fish-attracting structures of boards and logs constructed and sunk by NCWRC biologists in the backs of pockets and coves) also hold a fair number of crappie on Fontana. Early in the spring some lunker lodges will remain high and dry, but as soon as the water level covers them, the crappie will begin moving onto the cover.

One positive attribute of Fontana, Yow pointed out, is that a remnant of the lake's shad population usually survives the winter, even during cold winter when all the shad die off in other lakes.

Lake Chatuge, which straddles the North Carolina/Georgia border, also ranks among the best crappie lakes in the mountains. Sampling efforts conducted a year ago by the Georgia Wildlife Resources Division showed the crappie to average approximately 1 pound on this lake.

Unlike some other lakes in the far western mountains, Chatuge has modest slopes on many of its banks. Extensive blowdowns along many of those banks provide crappie fishermen with plenty of places to pick from. In addition, the two states' wildlife divisions, the Tennessee Valley Authority and the U.S. Forest Service maintain numerous fish attractors in shallow coves.

A reciprocal licensing agreement between North Carolina and Georgia allows anglers properly licensed by either state to fish anywhere on Lake Chatuge from any boat that is not anchored or tied to the shore. The agreement does not cover shoreline fishing.