# Mitchell River - some nice crappie



## FishWalton (Jul 22, 2010)

Not a bad day crappie fishing with my snowbird friend from Kansas. He's a crappie fishing machine back home. Thanks to crappie.com and PFF we became friends about 5 or 6 years ago and have been fishing together ever since. He and his wife spend a few winter months on Okaloosa Island.. 

Today was my first crappie sojourn this winter. Have sort of been waiting for my buddy to get here anyway. I'm a hit and miss crappie guy and he's far more experienced since that's about all he fishes back home in Kansas. He's primarily a jigger, but today we used minnows. I now have a long term minnow storage tank so can keep a good supply of minnows on hand. This is nice since we don't have a bait shop in DeFuniak. When bait is left over I have a place to keep them for a while. 

Anyway, we launched about 7:30 and fished a lake off Mitchell River. With the river on another hefty rise and soon to be rampage we hoped to find clear or decent water far back from the main Choctawhatchee River. This paid off rather well. 

My friend had 4 or 5 crappie in the boat before I finally found a straggler that was apparently out looking for his disappearing buddies. There seemed to be no particular pattern today. We caught them fishing 3 to 4 ft deep in 15 ft water and 6 to 8 feet deep in 15 to 18 ft water. A few were caught near the bottom in 8 ft water. It was a few here and there. They were scattered and not bunched up. Surface water was 62 degrees. 

When cleaning , a few had small amounts of roe...not nearly as much as what is showing up in Lake Talquin crappie.

Perfect morning for fishing although the Solunar table was not very favorable. I watch this source out of curiosity. but it really doesn't influence whether I go fishing or not.

We ended up with 24 crappie 10.5 to 12.5 inches. Tossed 3 dink crappie and lost several big ones. Used minnows for bait. 1 fat Warmouth decided it liked a minnow.

A good day with a good friend on my favorite waters. :thumbup:


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## AlbinoTurtle (Jan 7, 2017)

Awesome!


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## billyb (Aug 22, 2012)

Great report. I crossed the Choctawhatchee at Caryville today and it looked flooded.


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## Jason (Oct 2, 2007)

Man what a fish fry to come!!!


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## Bodupp (Oct 3, 2007)

Another great report and a fine mess of crappie JB.


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## FishWalton (Jul 22, 2010)

billyb said:


> Great report. I crossed the Choctawhatchee at Caryville today and it looked flooded.


Yep, it's flooded at Caryville but starting to drop. This means it will rise at CowFord on hwy 20 and will be back in the ramp parking lot. This will probably mess up the lower lakes backwater color. Will go find out tomorrow or Friday.


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## olegator (Dec 6, 2014)

Great report...like seeing slabs on that table top of yours.


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## Try'n Hard (Oct 23, 2008)

That guy needs to go back to Kansas or your gonna need a bigger table! I crappie fished from March to November and never got skunked..... Havent caught one in nearly 2 months!!


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## basnbud (Jul 20, 2011)

good lookin mess.


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## Flounder Hounder (Nov 9, 2008)

Great report! Those look tasty...


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## FishWalton (Jul 22, 2010)

*Back to the crappi lake*

Went back to the crappie hole this morning. As expected the river was up considerably from what it was day before yesterday. Water was running through the swamp and the whole lake was stirred up. We fished for about an hour, quit, then went to the Black Creek Bridge on hwy 3280. Fished the bridge a good while with only one small crappie snagged and lost. Up the creek to fish some cover and longline. My Kansas friend go a hefty 14 incher and a small Warmouth. The crappie is big enough to bake for a full meal so I'm going to try that....bake it whole like we do redsnapper, and see how it turns out.

The river has risen 3 ft since we fished it Tuesday and caught the mess of crappie.


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