Slow, deep trolling is a good way to load your boat with winter crappies.
The rod tip of the 16-foot crappie pole began quivering in the cold February air. With a sweep of the rod, Tom Sprouse of Advance quickly brought another chunky crappie aboard his boat. Sprouse had caught several 3/4 – to 1-pound crappie shortly after motoring upriver from the Old Whitney Landing at Badin Lake to the narrow reaches within sight of the Tuckertown dam where he employed a fishing technique made famous by Ronnie Caps and Steve Coleman, two Tennessee anglers.
From 1995-96, Capps and Coleman won more than $80,000 in cash prizes during tournament competitions and were dubbed “the No. 1 crappie fishing team in America.”
Sprouse also has earned a reputation as a skilled crappie angler through his winning performances at the Southern Crappie Association and N.C. Crappie Team trails.
He credits his success to “tightlining,” or what Capps and Coleman called “slow vertical trolling,” the technique expounded in Tim Huffman’s instructional book, “Winning Crappie Secrets.”
“I read the book and adapted many of the ideas and added a few wrinkles of my own,” Sprouse said.
Since boat control is critical to tightlining, a stable boat that can be controlled in a stiff breeze is needed. The boat should also be spacious enough to house numerous 16-foot trolling poles.
Sprouse fishes from a Ranger 620 Fisherman boat, primarily designed as a walleye boat. But Sprouse said its roomy interior and handling ability make it an ideal craft for tightlining.
When fishing alone, Sprouse rigs eight fishing poles spider-fashion in the front of the boat. Four of the poles are 16-foot Wally Marshall Tightline rods; the other four are 16-foot B&M trolling rods. The rods are set in two home-made rod holders housing four rod holders at each post.
The rods are grouped by manufacturer, and Sprouse uses rods from two manufacturers for a reason. He keys the rod actions to the egg sinkers of his tight-lining rigs. He likes how the Wally Marshall rods load up with 1/2-ounce egg sinkers and how the B’n’M rods load up with 3/8-ounce egg sinkers.
The rods and their assigned egg weights give the rods the right angle to detect light bites. The arrangements keep the rods resting 6 to 8 inches above the water, so Sprouse always knows the exact depths of his baits.
“Sometimes all you see are the rod tips twitching,” Sprouse said. “It’s not always easy to see bites with those long rods. Some fishermen paint their rod tips to make them more visible.”
Sprouse said attention to details makes a big difference in crappie fishing. For instance, whenever the fishing lines in his reels get discolored from muddy water, he wipes the lines clean.
“Some fishermen laugh when I tell them that, but they stop laughing when I get more bites than they do when they continue to fish with dirty lines,” he said.
A Zebco 11T Platinum series Triggerspin reel is mounted on each rod and spooled with 6-pound-test Triple Fish silicone line.
“Unfortunately, that line is no longer available,” Sprouse said.
Sprouse uses a Coleman/Capps double-hook rig made famous by the anglers from whom the rig gets its name.
The rig consists of a number 8 or 10 three-way swivel. The main line is tied to the top of the three-way swivel.
A 12-inch leader is tied to one side eye of the three-way swivel with either a 1/48- or 1/32-ounce jig or a number 2 red hook attached to the business end. An 18-inch leader runs from the remaining side eye of the three-way swivel to an egg sinker; the sinker is held fast by running and wrapping the line four times through the 1/2- or 3/8-ounce egg sinker. Then the line runs another 12 inches from the egg sinker to a hook or jig.
“The line must be wrapped at least four times around the egg sinker, or the sinker will slip loose,” Sprouse said.
The weights of the egg sinkers, the lengths of the leaders, and the jig sizes can be changed to meet specific fishing situations.
Sprouse makes his own jigs and powder coats them in a variety of colors. His favorite color combo for Badin is blue/chartreuse but cites yellow/chartreuse and orange/ chartreuse as other productive choices.
Sprouse adds four rods at the back of the boat when he fishes with a partner. His partners have been Steve Gentry and Randy Bowen of Winston-Salem and Glynn Sharon of Madison.
“Not every guy can free himself from his job to fish tournaments on a regular basis,” Sprouse said, explaining his change in partners. “I’ve got a good boss man who lets me go fishing when I need to.”
Sprouse, has worked at Joyce Foods in Winston-Salem for more than 21 years and serves as maintenance director. Fishermen also know him as an Amsoil dealer.
Sprouse tries not to overburden himself with rods while tightlining.
“Twelve rods are all my partner and I can handle,” he said.
The outer rods usually harbor the jigs tipped with minnows while the inner rods are fished with minnows.
Sprouse uses standard-sized crappie minnows and hooks them through their outer lips to keep them alive longer.
“For some reason, the jigs tipped with minnows catch the bigger crappie, and the bigger crappie are usually taken at the back of the boat,” Sprouse said. “In cold water — 47 to 48 degrees — like we’re fishing now, live minnows do better. But throughout the year, the best bait varies. Sometimes the fish prefer minnows; at other times, jigs.”
The double-hook rigs are set in continuous motion with the trolling motor. The proper speed is critical for successful slow vertical trolling. If the speed is too fast, the baits will rise out of the strike zone; if the speed is too slow, the upper hook on the rig will fall and tangle, and the rigs will not cover enough territory.
Sprouse determines the proper speed not by looking at any electronic speed indicators but by line angle. He’s at the correct speed when his lines are at 10- to 15-degree angles.
Typically, the angler in the front of the boat fishes for suspended fish while anyone at the back of the boat fishes for deeper fish near the bottom.
Before Sprouse begins tightlining, he assesses the depth of the fish by looking at his electronics.
At our outing, once Sprouse reached his fishing area, he checked his depth-finder for the depth the fish were holding. He saw fish symbols at 16 feet on his unit which he thought were crappie.
“A lot of fishermen set their units to see arches rather than fish symbols, but I’m comfortable with the fish symbols,” he said.
With the approximate depth determined, he set out his tightlining rigs accordingly.
“Always position your baits about 6 inches above what you think are crappies,” he said. “Like stripers, crappies look up for food.
“I’ll start by placing one of the double-hook rigs so the bottom hook is slightly above the depth where I’ve marked fish.
“Once the boat passes over the suspended fish, the fish will scatter, and that’s when the angler in the back of the boat will catch more fish because his rigs are positioned to catch fish close to the bottom.
“Although I’m targeting crappie at 16 feet at the moment, crappie are at different depths on any of the lakes I’ve ever fished, so I sample a variety of depths with my rigs. I’ve set out these eight rods to fish depths from 9 to slightly above 16 feet.”
To know how much line to pay out to get the baits at the desired depths, Sprouse has painted marks on his trolling poles as depth guides so he can let out the right amount of line.
“With long rods, it’s difficult to know how much line to let out without those painted markings,” he said.
Why use long rods?
For one, the 16-foot rods don’t spook the fish as much as shorter rods since they’re a good distance away from the movement of the boat. Long rods also cover a wide area and a variety of depths. and they help tightliners maintain their baits at the proper depths.
Fish never are reeled in because the rod length interferes with getting the fish to the boat. Instead, the fish is brought aboard by gently swinging it to the boat. No line is retrieved.
In that manner, the bait can be immediately returned to the water and set at the proper depth again since the length of line remains the same.
In addition, tight-liners keep their boats in motion. A snagged bait either tears free or breaks off. Sometimes, it’s freed with a slight pause of the boat which lets the egg sinker of the rig function as a built-in lure knocker. It drops and knocks the bait free.
While tightlining serves as an efficient way to fish, Sprouse said there are no short cuts to locating crappie at a given lake.
“Finding the best places involves a lot of trial and error and use of your electronics,” he said.
As a starting point, Sprouse fishes the upriver sections of lakes and has been successful at High Rock and Badin lakes using that approach.
“I like Potts Creek at High Rock, and the waters a short distance from Tuckertown dam at Badin.
“I don’t have any good reason for fishing upriver except that I always hear fish run upriver to spawn, so those areas seem like good places to start. Plus there’s always baitfish at those places, and crappie follow the baitfish.
“I haven’t had much luck fishing upriver at Tuckertown for some reason.”
Sprouse said current flows produced by the release of water through the dams aren’t factors in fishing upriver.
“I’ve found fishing for crappie in current to be inconsistent,” he said. “Sometimes, I’ll slay them if there’s current and at other times, I’ll have trouble getting bites.”
Too much current or strong winds can be detrimental to slow vertical trolling.
Sprouse said he can’t maintain the necessary snail-like speed if there’s too much current or wind. In those instances, he’ll either troll against the wind or current or go with them and put out a drift sock to slow the boat.
“With windy conditions, the fisherman at the back of the boat usually catches the most fish,” he said.
Though a skillful tightliner, Sprouse didn’t start out fishing that way. Like many crappie anglers, he began by beating the banks.
“I began crappie fishing at Lake Thom-A-Lex with Sam Hutchens, who now lives in Beaufort, and we used 8-foot fly rods and fished the banks with jigs and small plastics,” Sprouse said. “We fished mostly in the spring when the fish were shallow. I fished that way for some 15 or 20 years.
“Then small crappie tournaments started at Thom-A-Lex, and the first one I fished, I fished with my fly rod jigging the banks and placed in the top 20. I’ve been hooked on crappie tournaments ever since.”
When Sprouse started fishing highly competitive crappie tournaments, he realized he would have to change his method of fishing.
“ I watched other crappie fishermen and noted their techniques,” said the 46-year-old angler. “If you want to learn to become a better fisherman, I recommend fishing tournaments.
“Then I read about slow vertical trolling in Huffman’s book and took it from there. It’s a great way to fish because your line is always in the water, and you’re covering more fishing ground, and you’re covering it slowly and thoroughly.”
Sprouse doesn’t resort to jigging the banks for shallow-water crappie in the spring, either. Tightlining works at that time, too.
“That’s another advantage of long poles,” Sprouse said. “I can reach shallow water with them while I troll.”
Living in Advance, Sprouse doesn’t reside near any major bodies of water, so he doesn’t have a “home lake” like other fishermen. His favorite crappie holes include High Rock, Badin, and Jordan lakes.
For crappie, Sprouse rates Badin 7 on a scale of 10.
He described the fish we were catching as “typical, good tournament fish” for the lake.
“Last year, crappie from 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 pounds were common at Badin,” he said. “They’ve been running smaller this year. A 2-pound crappie is a big crappie for Badin. The biggest one I know of was caught during a N.C. Crappie Team Tournament. It weighed 2.41 pounds. My biggest crappie at Badin weighed 2.01 pounds, and I caught it at a tournament.
“With a six-fish tournament limit, I could win most tournaments at Badin with 8 pounds of fish.”
Sprouse’s assessment of Badin is in keeping with crappie studies of the lake.
The 2003 NCWRC crappie study at Badin Lake showed findings similar to the 2000 study in which there were a large number of fish greater than the minimum 8-inch size limit with moderate numbers of smaller, fast-growing fish.
White and black crappie reached harvestable size after 1 to 1 1/2 years, and their relative weights were at or above average for state waters.
Given the makeup of Badin’s crappie population, anglers can expect to experience moderate catch rates of large-sized crappie.
Sprouse described his ideal day for catching crappie as overcast with a slight ripple on the water and water that ranged from slightly stained to muddy.
Whatever the day, Sprouse won’t be found fishing the banks any more.
For him, tightlining is a much more productive way to catch more and bigger crappie.
“Tightlining is effective because it can be used at any lake in the country and at any time of the year,” he said.
Tightlining may require a major change in your way of fishing for crappie. If you’re open to change, you may discover, as Sprouse did, that tightlining will help you become a more successful crappie fisherman.
Be the first to comment