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The type of fishing I really enjoy is nearly upon us. It’s not very often during the year that you can point to a specific location on a body of water and say with unwavering certainty that a specific species of fish will be present. Well, in the case of ice-out crappies, that’s exactly what we can expect and the waiting is nearly over. Year after year, it’s one of those neat deals in the fishing world you can hang your hat on, like the fall run of shiners up the Rainy River that compels walleyes to chase them with reckless abandon. At times, nature, and how it works, can be very predictable, and it’s up to us to stay in tune with its rhythm and reap its bounty. That sounds a bit hokey, but you get what I mean. Ice-out crappie fishing is arguably one of the biggest no-brainers known to anglers. For somebody like me, that sounds pretty good.

Maybe the secret to ice-out crappie fishing is that there is no secret. Find a shallow, dark-bottomed bay, pitch a small jig tipped with a minnow or waxie under a slip bobber, and there you go. It really can’t get much easier and simpler than that. The shallow water bays are first to warm under the early spring sun, which causes plankton to show up and scoot around and small invertebrates to become active and hatch, which in turn attracts small baitfish that eat the invertebrates and at the same time, get the undivided attention of the feeding crappies. Whew, that was very long-winded but it does effectively prove the point that nature is incredibly cool and sometimes highly predictable. Throw us anglers at the top of the food chain and things work out pretty slick. Maybe not so slick for the crappies that are genetically programmed to be in the bays gorging themselves on minnows, but in any case, this annual event invariably shakes out to be fast crappie action for the ice-out angler.

For the past couple of seasons, I’ve augmented my fishing arsenal and options (increasing the fun-factor tenfold to boot) by also using my fly rod and a few time-tested fly patterns to fool these foolish crappies. Throwing and stripping small baitfish imitators such as a Micky Finn or Muddler Minnow streamer is a sure-fire way to put crappies in the boat. Also, beadhead patterns such as hare’s ears and pheasant tails in size #14 that represent the nymphal stage of mayflies can perform very well, too. Add just a pinch of scented plastic to the nymph’s hook and it becomes a real deal closer. At the risk of upsetting all of the crappie rights advocates out there (and I’ll bet you a bag of fillets they’re out there somewhere), I’d go so far as to say that flinging flies for crappies this time of year is altogether unfair. Hey, don’t blame me for all this cool cyclical nature stuff.

If local weather forecasts can be trusted, we’re less than a week away from temperatures in the 60s and the ice should be off area lakes. I look forward to spotting the first boats out in the bays again and seeing ice-out crappies on a stringer. It’s a very good thing in my book. It’s proof positive that Old Man Winter is finally off our backs and the open-water season is here.

Dan Brown’s weekly outdoor column is brought to you by Frankie’s Bait and Marine, in Chisago City, and St. Croix Outdoors, in St. Croix Falls, Wis.

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