Photo by Ron Sinfelt

By Jill J. Easton

It sounded like bubbles bursting or popcorn popping, but was actually fish feeding, which sounded wonderful after a long morning of nothing. The day was sunny and warm for midwinter, and a nice change after three days that started with frost on the roof.

After turning the trolling motor down to the lowest setting, I carefully eased the boat up to the western edge of the pond that was connected to the Jourdan River. The remains of last summer's lily pads were still floating, so there were obstructions underwater that would make jig-fishing difficult, so I tied a Crickhopper on instead.

The green-and-gold lure landed near a spot that hungry mouths had been working moments before. The lure sat for only tenths of a second before it was tapped, and my first fish of the day was hooked. Within an hour we had 10 nice crappie in the boat; dinner was in the cooler.

Contrary to what many people believe, it's possible to catch crappie in winter, and even to find them in shallow water. However, weather can be your friend and your enemy when you're fishing shallow for cold-weather speckled perch. You need a warm day with a temperature that goes up into the 70s to warm up the shallows. Obviously, those occur more often in the southern half of the Magnolia State.

Although catching crappie on the surface is an entertaining way to spend an afternoon, it's a more unusual occurrence than finding them deep. Crappie can be caught in winter by slow-trolling dropoffs, jigging in or close to brushpiles (especially those with schools of minnows nearby) or fishing where streams and rivers cut eddy holes as they run into bigger waterways or lakes.

There are a few important tidbits to remember that can make bringing home a winter limit easier. Fish are cold-blooded, and when temperatures are low, most species look for the warmest water available. That usually means moving deeper.

When crappie get chilled down, they move very slowly, so jigging and other lure movements should be very slow. Since any activity by these winter fish burns up valuable stores of energy, the closer you get your bait to a fish, the more likely it is to take that bait.

"During strong low-pressure systems, fish suck back in the brush, making them much harder to catch," Guy Winters, a tackle manufacturer and crappie expert, said. "They get into the brush to lean up against it and wait for the weather to change. They don't care much about eating. During those times, baits have to be very close to do any good."

To get started trolling, you first need the right equipment. Unless you have a thorough knowledge of the underwater structure on the lake, you'll definitely need a good map, preferably a topographic one. This can direct you to the structure around which the bait and the crappie are likely to be hanging out. A quality depthfinder that can show cuts in the waterway bottom, brushpiles and schools of baitfish is also invaluable for this type of fishing.

Though minnows can be trolled, jigs matched with long plastic grubtails are more practical. Once you pinpoint a concentration of fish around cover, you can then stop and drop the live minnows down to them.

Start your search for crappie using bright colored jigtails. Pink, pearl, chartreuse or anything with glitters will usually attract winter crappie. If light colors don't get any action, switch to dark blue, black or motor oil. Line should be no heavier than 10- to 12-pound-test.

CREEL AND SIZE LIMITS Most waters in Mississippi have a 10-inch minimum size limit on crappie and a daily limit of 30 per angler. On the Tenn-Tom Waterway, the minimum size limit is 9 inches.

Guy Winters is intimately acquainted with this technique for fishing; he can suggest a way to create a rig for it. "On the first eye of a three-way swivel, attach 8 inches of monofilament and tie on a 1/2-ounce bell or egg sinker," he said. "These shapes prevent snagging and aid in getting free from the brush and underwater structures you troll over. The second eye holds your hook and bait and should be about a foot long. The third eye is attached to the line going to the reel."

Winters also suggests having a bunch of pre-tied leaders handy, with each rigged to a safety-pin-type snap. In cold weather, these take the least amount of time for rerigging when you break off. That's especially true if you're wearing gloves.

For optimum action, have more than one rod rigged and in a rodholders. Smart anglers also have several buoys pre-tied with line and a weight. These can be tossed out to mark the location when you find a school of fish.

Turn your trolling motor to its lowest setting; then, run very, very slowly over downed trees, brush piles or the edges of underwater creek and river channel edges. Allow the baits to drop right into the structure. Remember that winter crappie won't move far to attack a bait, and the species is notorious for always feeding up, rather than diving deeper after a lure or minnow.

If the situation permits, get upwind of the area you want to fish and simply drift, using the motor only for minor corrections. Even the quietest trolling motor can't match the stealth of coasting with the wind.

When you get a bite, immediately throw out the buoy, so you can return to that location and, hopefully, find the rest of the school. Keep making passes across the spot until you quit catching fish - or you can try stopping to drop a minnow down to the spot.

It is also worth noting that older brushpiles are frequently better than brand new ones. As brush ages, it begins to break down. This encourages several varieties of algae to grow and bloom on the structure as they take advantage of the nutrients being released. This algae garden draws in plankton looking for food, and shad and other minnows dine on both algae and the plankton, so their schools hang close. This naturally draws in the crappie to dine on the feeding minnows.