We'll be in EP47 the week of July 4th. My partners are interested in crappie.

I love watching them too. Any special tricks it locations for them?

I would look in the bays that have a good stand of weeds. They can be tough to find that time of year. To be honest, when I find them it’s pretty much by accident. But once you find them they are eager to bite .

I'm by no means a fishing expert, and even less so with crappie, but we found them while fishing for walleye in late June last year. They were on the bottom in probably about 12-20ft. We didn't have a depth finder, so I"m just guessing.

early july crappies should start moving out from that 15' type depth to suspending over deeper water , a depth finder will aid in finding them ,
if crappies are shallow i've had very good success with the slurpie jig and for a little deeper water i throw a jig spinner with a twister tail.

One big key for early summer crappie is tall weeds and the break of day. Fish the deep weed edge literally at first light and they will be there and are easily caught. As soon as that sun tops the trees they slide out deeper or tuck inside the weeds.

Stealth is very important and little roadrunners or pinky jigs on thill stealth fixed bobbers will get the job done but being quiet on flat calm water with fish who are used to stillness can be no easy task. I like a section of yoga mat at my feet to deaden noise in such situations. Shifting feet, opening tackle boxes, setting down paddles etc. can all be detrimental.

^^^ yes a big fan of the road runners too ! i generally dont use a bobber thou.

shock: "^^^ yes a big fan of the road runners too ! i generally dont use a bobber thou."

Not for the roadrunner. I have caught many hundreds of crappie though on a pinky jig and bobber. I always loved watching that bobber slide down.

Black crappies seem to have a particular fondness to all things wood. A tree in the water or even a stump may hold them.

Since my hoped for circumnavigation of Basswood this August will put me into some big shallow bays I thought it might be kind of neat to do a bit of pan fishing. Troll a roadrunner or small crappie crank bait behind the boat. A bluegill or a crappie might be a nice change of pace. After all, how many walleye can a guy eat ;-)

There is one REALLY important factor that I don't believe anyone has touch on yet. Before you spend a lot of time fishing for crappie make sure the lake you are fishing has a fishable population of them. Doesn't matter what lure you use or when or how you fish them if they don't exist in the lake to start with.

I just did a quick look at lakes around EP 47 using the DNR lake finder tool. I looked at Caribou, Meeds, Allen, Horseshoe, Vista, Gaskin, Misquah, and Henson. None of the DNR lake surveys indicate crappie being in any of the lakes. Very few surveys indicated any kind of pan fish to speak of. Some of the surveys are a little old but its worth keeping them in mind if you set out on a quest to find crappie in that area.

Now I didn't look at every lake in that area just the bigger ones so maybe you'll still find a lake with some crappie but I would spend some time researching those surveys before you put together your fishing plans. I have heard Prune Lake just south of Poplar has crappie but its outside the BWCA and I believe requires a bushwhack.

Excellent catch nofish. Indeed.......not catching many crappie if they ain't there.

Never know what you might catch while fishing for crappie though. After failing to catch walleye on lake Chickenbone on Isle Royale I put on a little roadrunner desperate to catch something, anything, and thought some perch might cooperate and supply a mess for our hungry crew. Within 20 minutes I had 4 fat walleye (just like I knew what I was doing ;-)

I have spent considerable time in the EP 47 area and never a sign of any crappies. If that is an important goal I have read many reports of pretty darn good crappie fishing out of EP 33, particularly Gabbro and Bald Eagle lakes. Nice area too. Not too late to change plans:)

Well, I tentatively have a reservation at EP26 Wood Lake.

Overall, Wood, Good, and Indiana all look like better fishing lakes with more diverse populations...including crappie.

My son wants to do a trip with his cousins the summer of 2020 so I think we will do more of a loop route at EP47 next year.