Crappie in Reelfoot Lake?

[Daryk Campbell Sr]

My Father in law is not really a fisherman. He is going with a couple of his friends down to Reelfoot.  They will be targeting crappie.  I have read about the ice minnow, but believe that to be a deep choice.  

What kind of set up can I teach him so he has a decent chance to catch a couple each day he is there?  

I believe they will be fishing minnows and the lake is pretty shallow where he will be,  with lots of stumps.   

[snagged in outlet 3]

Minnows

[Quillback]

Never have fished it myself, but have family history there.  My grandad used to fish it in the 50's and 60's and my uncle, who lives in Memphis does fish it every once in a while, but hasn't been over there in a few years.

Reelfoot has always been loaded with crappie and bream but they tend to run small.  It's shallow as you noted.  My grandad would use a fly rod, with a small cork 2feet below the cork and a split shot a few inches above the hook, and bait it with minnows.  He'd drop that cork on one side of a stump or tree, let is sit for a couple of seconds, if nothing happened, pull it around to the front of the tree, then move it to the other side.  Move on to the next tree or laydown and repeat.  If the fish were deeper then he might "tightline" basically doing the same thing without the cork.

 

Some errors above, can't fix it for some reason - But I meant to say a small cork, hook 2 to 3 feet below the cork and a split shot about 6 inches above the hook.

[MoCarp]

 

[Haris122]

Wish I could help but unfortunately when I went none of us 3 caught a single crappie though that was what we primarily tried to catch. Minnows, jigs, little crankbaits, all that, and not one crappie.