Catch Crappie Now at Lake of the Ozarks

Catch Crappie Now at Lake of the Ozarks Outdoor Revelations Bill Cooper for RDN 2/9/17

Crappie are the mot popular panfish in most parts of the country. Missouri’s Lake of the Ozarks is chock full of the tasty fish and anglers can catch them any month of the year. “Sure you can catch crappie here at LOZ now,” guide Jack Uxa said over the phone. “You could have caught them all winter long, too, had you been here.” Lake of the Ozarks is a crappie producing machine and has been for decades. Two factors are key to crappie abundance there. A bountiful food supply in the form of slow growing shad is a major cause of the heavy crappie numbers, according to Uxa. Too, the abundance of cover in the lake gives crappie superb places to hide, feed and rest. “Lake of the Ozarks is home to thousands of boat docks,” says Uxa. “And many of those boat docks have brush placed around them put there by the dock owners.” Many dock owners are also crappie fishermen. Having a crappie bed right out the back door is a dream come true for many homeowners on the lake. It’s easy fishing. Build a dock, toss in some cedars or discarded Christmas trees and the crappie will come. “The sweet thing about those docks,” say Dale Goff of Rolla, “is that anyone can fish them. I’ve fished dozens of them over the years and caught thousands of crappie at Lake of the Ozarks.” Dock owners expect anglers to fish around their docks. However, anglers should respect the docks as private property. Stay off the docks and good landowner-fisherman relationships stay in tact. Both Goff and Uxa agree that winter time is a great time to crappie fish. “If it is above 35 degrees, I will be on the lake most weekends,” Goff said. “I love it. You will see a few die hards, but not many people like to fish in cold weather. You can have some good spots pretty much to yourself. To, you don’t have to fight the boat traffic that is so prevalent in the summer time.” Uxa spends in the neighborhood of 290 days a year on the water guiding fishing clients. “Summer time is just crazy,” he said. “I seldom get a day off. People who vacation here, or have a condo like to fish in warmer weather for the most part.” I met Uxa at the lake a couple of weeks ago to spend the day with him, both bass and crappie fishing. Temperatures were supposed to climb into the fifties by afternoon. It was late afternoon before that happened. Once on the water, Jack nailed a small bass on a jerkbait in a matter of minutes. Then matters got tough. I heard the old adage, ”you shoulda been here yesterday.” A stable wether pattern had hovered over the lake for several days, along with heavy cloud cover. “The fishing has been great for days,” Uxa said. “Now today, th cloud cover is gone and the wind is out of the east.” “Wind out of the east, fish bite the least,” I chided. “I don’t really buy into that theory,” Jack explained. “It is true to some degree, but we will put a pattern together as the day goes by.” Bass fishing was slow. Uxa watched his electronics for baitfish near docks. “Here we go,” he said an hour into the trip. “There’s a ball of bait fish a few feet out from this dock.” Uxa positioned his Nitro boat facing the corner of a dock. He grasped his chartreuse, plastic crappie jig, pulled a heavy arch into his rod and slingshotted the jig several feet back up under a dock. He allowed the jig to sink perhaps six or eight feet and lifted his rod tip slightly. Bingo. He swung the first crappie of the day into the boat. Crappie filets are heavenly and I wasn’t bashful about asking Ux to put some in the live well as I kept filming. Uxa methodically worked his way around the dock, flipping his Bobby Garland Baby Shad jig into openings between the dock floats. Crappie after crappie fell to his technique. “These guys are running smaller than yesterday,” Jack said. “I caught some dandy crappie yesterday. The stronger light of today may have run the bigger fish to a little deeper water.” I wasn’t complaining. He steadily added crappie to the livewell. I made plans for a crappie dinner as I filmed the fishing action. The bite slowed and Uxa moved on down the bank, with his bass rod in his hands again. The bass bite remained slow, but he picked up the occasional largemouth. Soon Uxa found another ball of shad near a dock. He traded the bass rod for the crappie rod and went to work on crappie once again. “Wow, look at this on the locator,” he said. “Those white spots are crappie.” The white spots created a blur on the LED screen. It was a big ball of crappie hanging at the edge of the dock. Jack was already swinging crappie into the boat. “Pick up a rod, Bill,” he said. “This is going to last a while.” Having a good deal of film footage laid down, I grabbed a rod and began flipping a jig towards the dock. It took me a few minutes to get the right depth, but soon I, too, slung one crappie after another into the boat. “I can’t wait to get these babies into hot grease,” I laughed. “Well, anybody can do this, Bill,” Jack said. You can Google Uxa under Jack’s Guide Service, or give him a call at 573-434-2570. Don’t tarry too long. His phone rang steadily while we fished.