Welcome to CatchingCrappie.com

  After waiting for what seemed like months, I finally had time to get to Smith Mountain Lake to get at those slab size crappie! Though I was skeptical about the size of crappie that my friend Tony Helm claimed to be catching, I knew that a lake of that size could hold slabs as big as he claimed.

  We hit the lake at sun up. Now I know that most folks believe that you have to be on the water early, but I don't subscribe to that point of view. Now there are exceptions. For example, I do believe that you can catch surface feeding fish at dawn and sun set. That's another story. We were there at sun up because my fishing croney said that he caught his fish early. And, I wasn't going to give him any reason (excuse) for not putting us on some slab size crappie.

  It was a short ride from the ramp to slab crappie spot. I was just getting hunkered down good in the boat when we turned in to a cove. My first words were, "We have fished this area a hundred times and I've never seen a slab sized crappie come out of here." Tony said "I know, but this is where we were catching them." I started casting jigs towards the shore. However, I had one eye on Tony at all times to see what he fishing. The first thing I noticed was that he was rigging up a slip bobber to use minnows. Now I know minnows are good bait for crappie, but I like to think of them as the equivalent of putting training wheels on a bike. Correction, I used to think of them that way.

  If you have some fishing stories to share, send them to me here and I'll post them. Also if you have pictures of your catch, send them in. I'm in the process of creating a photo / brag board.

  Feel free to vist the Crappie Forum and ask questions or leave suggestions and tips on catching crappie.