I've been interested in trying the Blakemore Crappie Thunder Jig ever since I laid eyes on it in a catalog. Basically what we have here is a Blakemore Roadrunner jig with a soft plastic tube jig skirt attached. It's such a simple concept, I don't know why it wasn't thought of sooner! Sometimes Crappie fishing is that way, you don't notice the obvious!
But the proof is in the puddin' as they say. I bought several packages of these jigs from Bass Pro to give them a try and see if they would haul in the slab Crappie. So I headed out to Lake Fort Gibson to give them a try on the Crappie there. To get the best performance from these jigs, remember to use the proper fishing reels or your success rate could suffer.
The morning started off nice and warm as it generally does this time of year. The main reason I bought these jigs was to review them to see how they would perform with a new technique I'd been wanting to try. Well, let me clarify. The technique isn't new, it's long lining for Crappie, but it's new to me.
Now just about any Crappie Jig will work for Crappie. Heck, some people make Crappie jigs by tying on pieces of brightly colored yarn to bare hooks and do well that way. However, as most of us know, some jigs catch more Crappie than others. This is why I was anxious to try the Crappie Thunder Jigs.
I set out 4 lines behind the boat. Each line was put out about 40 feet, with
two 1/16th oz Crappie Thunder Jigs tied on, about a foot to 18" apart. The more line you let you, the deeper your jigs will go. Also, the heavier your weight, the deeper your jigs will go. I wanted to fish the water column between 8 and 15 feet.I was fishing near some creek channel drops in about 20 to 30 feet of water. Crappie will suspend in these areas when it get's warm and since they're generally scattered, they can be hard to pinpoint.
I had only went a short ways when one rod started bending. I set the hook (actually, when longlining for Crappie, the fish set the hook) and brought in a nice 11 inch Crappie. Just barely legal in this lake, so that makes him (or was it a her?) a keeper.
The day progressed much like this. I had a few throw backs and a few keepers. The fish were scattered just like I thought. I also caught quite a few White Bass and two Channel cats. I ended the day around noon with 9 keeper Crappie. The biggest was 14 inches.
The last hour of trolling, I tied half of the lines with normal 1/16th oz tube jigs and some standard marabou crappie jigs to see if the fish preferred one over another. They did, they much preferred the Crappie Thunder jigs over the other two types by about 2 to 1. Now I know that's not a scientific test, but it's good enough for me to order more for my tackle box the next time I go longlining for Crappie!
