The Transition From Spring To Summer

Transition to Summer

On the way out of spawning areas, back toward the main lake, crappies move across flats and tend to hold on or near the first major drop-off they come across. Water flowing out of the spawning area (bay, channel, creek, or pond) often holds higher plankton counts than the main lake, attracting hordes of shiners, shad, chubs, and other minnows. Adjacent cover in the form of newly emerging cabbage, deep bulrushes, stumps, or brushpiles attracts large groups of crappies and holds them for a time, before they eventually filter off to summer habitat. But there is no universal manner in which crappies behave at any time of year. Much depends on lake type, water clarity, latitude, primary forage options, and a host of other factors.

Studies suggest that, during spring and through the spawning period, crappies increase their activity during the day, peaking at dusk, then become less active at night. After the spawn, however, crappies that have moved from spawning sites into confined open water feed heavily after dark. On both murky and clear South Dakota natural lakes studied by Dr. Chris Guy at South Dakota State University, using radio telemetry, he recorded substantial movements of crappies beginning at dusk and lasting through the night. During the day, they were less active, but moved closer to shallow cover at dusk and remained there until dawn.

“After the spawning period, the crappies we tracked in two lakes didn’t move nearly as much,” Guy said. “Black crappies in a clear natural lake shifted into deeper water after the spawn, though most remained at the same end of the 1,000-acre lake. In the rather murky impoundment, where we studied white crappies, some moved off shore while others remained in shallow cover. The differences may have been due more to environmental conditions than to differences between the species.”

Postspawn crappies in natural lakes switch rather swiftly from shallow cover to “nowhere land,” and all the popular spots suddenly fall flat. Many anglers lose track of transition crappies in lakes they fish because of the diurnal shift described above. Crappies that fed during the day and during low-light periods all through spring may suddenly begin feeding almost exclusively at night in waters considered clear, off-clear, or of average visibility.

Even in water considered cloudy, the night bite can be exceptional during the transition from Postspawn to summer. Crappie fishermen along the Georgia-Alabama border have long known this to be true in West Point Lake on the Chattahoochee River, where the water is far from clear and secchi disks are visible only down to 3 feet or less. During the May crappie run there, a brightly lit flotilla of boats can be seen every night from the Route 219 Bridge. Anglers arrive in droves every evening and anchor along the edge of submerged creek channels with brush, waiting for crappies to go on their nightly feeding binge. In almost all environments, nocturnal crappies move shallower to feed at night. This schedule can persist into early summer and, in some cases, continues until the following spring.

West Point crappie enthusiasts used a variety of fishing lights both to see better and as fish attractors. During the day, small shad form tight schools offshore, feeding on plankton. After dark, shad schools disperse, generally moving shallower and toward the bank. Scattered formations, positioned along shallower edges, are far easier for crappies to intercept than the tight balls that form during the day, in open water with no barriers to stop them. At night in all environments, crappies often move into very shallow water in search of minnows that occupy open water during the day, or minnows that become much more vulnerable around cover at night. The crappie has the largest eyes (as a percentage of body size) of any North American freshwater fish, probably providing them an advantage over their prey in darkness. They are uniquely adapted to foraging at night.

As mentioned, crappies move out of the shallow spawning habitats of spring toward summer haunts. In most natural-lake environments, they suspend during the day in summer—shifting vertically from day to night, seeking shade, depth, or cover during the day and shallower, plankton-rich areas, foraging during low-light periods and at night.