Troll or fish brushpiles to fill your cooler with Lake Wateree summer crappie.
Summertime,” the old song runs, “and the living is easy. Fish are jumping, and the cotton is high.”
I don’t know who wrote that song, but the flat-out facts of the matter are that one prime quarry for the hot-weather angler, crappie, don’t do much jumping. In fact, about the only popular freshwater species I can think of that might rank lower when it comes to aerial acrobatics would be catfish and bream.
Their lack of jumping ability aside, crappie can be a prime target for the fisherman with sufficient gumption to deal with the heat and humidity of a South Carolina summer.
The fishing for slabs offered by Lake Wateree, the last impoundment on the long chain of lakes dotting the Catawba River, is first-rate. Long overshadowed by Lake Wylie, its upstream neighbor, Lake Wateree has in recent years come into its own.
Several factors likely explain that development. First and foremost, the impoundment holds plenty of crappie. Beyond that, an unexplained, little publicized, but unquestionably dramatic drop-off in crappie numbers at Lake Wylie has refocused the attention of many fishermen. Then too, there has been a recent surge in development around Wateree, and with it comes fishermen living on or near its shores, the addition of brushpiles and other crappie “hides” to its waters, and more of the docks crappie love to utilize as home headquarters.
Whatever the case, slabs live there, and summer is a mighty fine time to catch them. With that in mind, let’s turn to some of the tricks of the crappie-catching trade, Lake Wateree style.
Tactics/Techniques
Years ago, Jackie Hite, a veteran crappie fisherman who has scored high in his share of tournaments and has an uncanny knack for finding slabs, offered some significant insight as we shared a boat.
Although Lake Murray has to be considered Hite’s home water, he has spent considerable time all over the Palmetto State in an ongoing quest for big crappie. When I mentioned Wateree to him and asked his thoughts on solving its crappie equation, Hite had some ready answers.
“There are a bunch of ways to find crappie,” Hite suggested. “With really good electronics, you can locate both submerged structure and fish staging around it, but you don’t have to have high-dollar gear to do quite well.”
Read more in the South Carolina Sportsman archives, and be sure to subscribe to ensure you don’t miss a single information-packed issue.
Digital issues are also available for download to computers and smartphones.
Be the first to comment