Millions of anglers sit at home in winter waiting for spring to bring crappies into the shallows. Why wait? Many places have shallow, open-water crappies all winter long. From the flatland reservoirs of Oklahoma and Kansas to the marshy lakes, backwaters, and channels of Florida, shallow crappies can be easier, even more numerous than deep fish, even in hill-land reservoirs.

Most rivers that feed Midsouth, Midwest, and far-southern reservoirs have crappies. River crappies tend to stay in the far upper reaches of the reservoir, wintering in the areas just below (downstream of) the farthest upstream reach of the river channel. For the most part, these fish are ignored in winter, making them all a little less spooky. Contrary to popular wisdom, winter crappies can be aggressive, actively hounding schools of shad, suspending on flats, and hunting through shallow brushpiles. For the anglers discussed here, 50 crappies or more from 12 feet of water or less is a pretty typical day at the office between December and March.

Kansas

Ned Kehde, Field Editor and longtime contributor to In-Fisherman on many fishing topics, lives in Kansas, right on the ice-fishing boundary. “I don’t ice-fish for crappies any more,” Kehde says. “I’m getting too old. But, if I wanted to do it, I could still find crappies in 8 feet of water in the far back end of creek channels from December right through the first of March. We have deep patterns in 25 feet of water all winter, too. But we have shallow fish on brushpiles up in the rivers, and crappies can suspend 10 to 12 feet down over mainlake brushpiles in 18 feet of water. As mentioned, crappies can be in feeder creeks as shallow as 8 feet, on the far upstream edge of the river channel where it breaks off.

“The most prolific shallow pattern occurs way upriver, at the top of the reservoir in the riverine portion, where the deepest holes are about 20 feet deep,” Kehde says. “Brushpiles occur in all depths, from 20 feet up to 10 feet. Most people look deep in winter, but crappies use those 10-foot brushpiles. Later in winter crappies go shallower and most anglers fish those brushpiles. Shallow crappies are largely ignored from December through February.”

Shallow crappies mean spending less time prospecting, less time waiting for a jig to drop and less time playing fish, which all adds up to less time spent on each spot. That frees anglers to try more spots. Finding crappies in shallow water isn’t just luck in winter. In fact, it should be the goal, but crappies may not use the same shallow water spots every day, so the next logical question for Kehde was: Do conditions play a part in bringing crappies shallow during the cold months?

“I can find no rhyme or reason as far as conditions are concerned. I can’t quite peg it down,” Kehde admits. “Barometric pressure, the full moon and weather patterns seem to have nothing to do with it. I still find them through trial and error by searching brushpiles and drifting flats for cruising crappies that are chasing shad or hunting invertebrates. In Kansas reservoirs, though, I can find fish somewhere in shallow water every day between December and March.

“Shallow crappies can be pretty darn aggressive during winter,” he adds. “Most of the time I’m fishing vertically in brushpiles situated in 8 to 12 feet of water, with 1/16- to 1/32-ounce chenille, marabou, or tube jigs, depending on which is working best, and primarily we jig vertically in these rockpiles. Sometimes the best brushpiles are on a channel bend, sometimes on a flat, and sometimes on the most gradual slope into the river channel. The secret is to have a lot of brushpiles in a variety of places and not necessarily on the lip of the channel break. Flatland reservoirs have gradual tapers to the channel in many places, with sharp drops on the bends. It’s all trial and error. On a good day you can whack a bunch of fish, but you never really strike out for crappies down here even in shallow water, even in the middle of winter.”