Fall is hunting time, but you also can enjoy some of the year's best fishing.
It's in top gear for all species right now, and there probably isn't a place in Arkansas that won't give your tackle a workout.
For example, right now crappie fishermen are catching big crappie from deep structure on large reservoirs such as lakes Ouachita, Bull Shoals, Greeson, Beaver and Maumelle.
You probably won't catch as many crappie as you do in the spring during the spawn, but the fish you catch are generally bigger. The most attractive aspect of fall crappie fishing is that there are so many ways to do it.
Bill Eldridge of Benton fills his freezer every fall with an annual pilgrimage to Lake Ouachita. He fishes deep brush piles in the area near Denby Point and Tompkins Bend. The brush he fishes depends on the wind direction because that influences the way crappie orient to the structure.
He tosses a light lead jig head, 1/16-ounce to 1/32-ounce, beyond the brush and counts down one second for every foot he wants the jig to fall. If the brush pile is 20 feet deep, he counts down to 20 and begins reeling. His wife, Kelly Eldridge, a competent crappie angler in her own right, is more precise. She counts down by looking at her watch.
The object is to make the jig nick the top of the brush. Crappie will rise out of the cover to take it.
A variation of this technique works at Lake Maumelle, too. Brush piles are not allowed at Lake Maumelle, but Central Arkansas Water has allowed anglers to sink artificial structure made of PVC in recent years. Algae coats the PVC, which attracts invertebrates, which attracts baitfish, which attracts crappie. Plus, crappie orient to any structure that is available.
You can use the countdown method on PVC structures, but you also can catch crappie in the fall with light jigging spoons and live minnows. They don't snag as easily on PVC as they do on brush.
On lakes Greeson and DeGray, spider rigging is popular and productive. Spider rigging involves slowly trolling multiple rods over brush piles.
Jerry Blake and Tammy Richardson are crappie fishing guides who have refined this method to a fine art. They label their rods by colored tape and set their bobbers to suspend live minnows at different depths. When fish demonstrate a preference for bait at a certain depth, Blake and Richardson set their other rods for that depth, too.
Of course, that can change at the next brush pile, but making adjustments is part of the fun.
Alan Thomas and I use a poor man's version of the spider rig at Lake Dardanelle. We tie a weight to the terminal end of a main line and attach three dropper lines about 8-12 inches apart. This is a static presentation and you will get hung up, but it's worth the hassle if fish are biting.
Now is also a great time to catch big spotted bass on our major rivers, especially those in south Arkansas.
A couple of weeks ago I caught a 20-inch "spot" on the Buffalo River. That prompted Jackie Rauls of Rison to send me some photos of giant "spots" he's been catching with Jim Beardon of Hot Springs Village on the lower White River around Jack's Bay. Rauls said they have been catching their fish on small crankbaits and soft-plastic tube jigs, or "gitzits." Their fish have averaged about 2 pounds each, and judging from his photos that might be conservative.
Rauls is not like most of us day trippers. Whether he's turkey hunting or bass fishing, he goes for days and weeks at a time.
This is also a great time to catch big largemouths, as evidenced by the fish that Matt Hedrick has been catching lately at lakes Atkins and Maumelle.
On a recent trip to Lake Atkins, Hedrick used a Spro Frog to catch a pair of Florida-strain largemouths that weighed about 7 and 9 pounds each.
He caught them by pitching the frog through trees as close to the bank as possible. Sometimes the fish hit next to the bank, but others hit after Hedrick worked the frog into deeper water with a "walk the dog" retrieve. The 9-pounder struck when the frog came to rest after striking the base of a cypress tree.
These aren't big fish tales. All of these guys supplied photos.
It's enough to make us question our priorities. Fall is a time for hunting, but I do love to catch fish.
Sports on 10/29/2015