Catching Crappie on Spoons

In the past I hardly ever used spoons for catching crappie. In fact, it was the last lure I would use. Well that was then. Now I always have a few spoons ready to fish.

I kind of stumbled onto using spoons. I was moving from one of my go to crappie spots to another near by spot when this occured. Normally I would have cranked up the outboard and wasted no time in getting to the next spot. But this time I decided to just take my time and use the trolling motor to get to there. As I enterd the mouth of the creek, I noticed large fish arches on my depth finder at about 30 feet. I assumed they were stripers and figured thst since I wasn't in any hurry, I'd might as well see if I could jig up a few. As fate would have it, I didn't have my striper lures on the boat. I did have a bass rod and an old spoon that I really can't remember ever using. To keep this history lesson short, I'll just say this. The arches that I thought were stripers were in fact 18 inch crappie! 

I went from catching 12 to 14 inch crappie, which by the way are nice fish, to 18 inch crappie! I tried using my 1/16 ounce jigs as well as 1/8 and 1/4 ounce tube jigs and didn't get a bite. As soon as I went back to the spoon, I started catching them again. After the bite slowed down, instead of going to my next normal spot, I decided to look for more creek mouths. 

Not every creek mouth I found had fish in them. But when I did mark fish 20-30 feet deep, the spoon wored like magic. The technique I use is to let the spoon drop to the bottom on slack line. Next I give the rod a sharp jerk upwards as if I'm setting the hook on a bass. I let the spoon sink again. I do this a few times just to see if there are fish on the bottom. If I don't get any takers, I'll quickly wind up to the level that I'm marking fish and start the jerking upward routine over. If I don't get bit after that, I'll wind all the up to the surface and repeat the whole routine. 

I don't remember for sure who made the spoon I was using back then. I believe it may have been an Hopkins spoon. Now I almost always use a Bink's Spoon. It was developed by a well known guide, Darrell Binkley of Bink's Guide Sevice, Norfolk Arkansas. His spoons catch everything from Crappie to Stripers.

In the summer when fish are deep, try a spoon and you will be surprised at how well they work.

 

Check out the fishing of Darrell using his spoon to catch Stripers on Lake Norfolk in Arkansas Bink's video

We sell Bink's Spoons here. CatchingCrappie Market Place