crappie

[ragincajun]

When will the crappie start going to banks to spawn in the Osage Bluff Area.

[Predator1]

Hi Ragincajun,

I figure April will be off the chain and on the hook. I was curious about your screen name. I am from Shreveport and moved to Springfield in 2001. What about you?

Charles Jackson

[decoded]

I think it may be sooner rather than later if it warms back up next week... We found them pretty shallow upstream from Bucksaw last weekend. By shallow, I mean hanging out in the top foot or two of water 2/3 of the way back in the creek. Course the water was 60 Sunday, probably nothing near that today.

[shaker]

Usually the lower end of the lake turns on later than the upper end so I would guess that in the Osage Bluff area the spawn would start sometime in the middle of a April to the last of April? That is if the weather holds about the same as we are now having. If the Spring rains come and the lake goes up a couple to maybe ten feet high and the corps holds water during that time and then begins to drop the water levels in May like they usually do then the spawn will be much later if it happens at all.

If you get there in April and the fish aren't in a spawning mode I would load up and head to either the Osage, Grand, or Tebo arms and start about mid way up the arms and go up and down the main lake arms searching the main feeder creek arms for fish.

Good Luck.

RB