What's up at the dock?

Some crappie fishermen jokingly accuse fishing tackle manufactuers of putting brush, stumps and other snags in the water to boost the sale of lures.

However, I can tell you they missed a few places. Take a boat dock I have been fishing recently. After fishing for almost an hour, dropping a small jig in a boat slip without finding any brush, a bucket containing nine large crappie indicated the fish were there.

Usually, prople will sink their Christmas trees and other brush in these slips to attract the crappie. The fish will bury themselves in that brush and you have to send your jig in after them. That is why you usually expect to lose some jigs when you go crappie fishing. It's a rare day when you can use the same jig all day long.

However, that's what I have been doing. I have caught a limit of 15 crappie the last three times I fished this dock using the same jig. When you are using two pound test line, you don't need any brush around.

A Lamar, Mo., crappie fisherman, Bob Harrison, told me that the old river bed used to pass near the dock and the fish traveled through this passageway while searching for food. Whatever the reason, the fish seemed to move in schools because when you would catch one fish, you knew you would get more right away.

Harrison paused and flipped his 1/16th ounce jig under the dock and allowed it to sink slowly. As the jig sank, there was a faint tap at the end of his line and he quickly set the hook. A few seconds later he was pulling a large crappie out of the water.

By the end of the morning, we had our limit of crappie, most of them in the 3/4-to-1-pound range. The fishing hasn't been a consistent thing. You might catch three or four and then it slows down for awhile, which means schools are probably moving in and out. They really don't have anything to hold them there, but as long as there are bait fish under the dock, they are going to be around.

For Harrison, the boat dock has been a consistent producer. He catches fish throughout the winter as long as there is open water.

"At some of the docks I have fished at the Lake of the Ozarks, you can catch crappie almost all year long," Harrison said. "Some people think you have to wait until April, when the crappie move into the banks to spawn before you can consistently catch them, but I have caught limits of crappie off docks right in the middle of the coldest winters.

"I remember fishing in February at the Lake of the Ozarks when the rest of the lake was frozen over, but I would catch big crappie off the docks by breaking a hole through the ice. It's normal for the fish to be around the docks because a lot of the time that's where the bait fish will move in for food and shelter so the crappie are going to be there feeding on the shad."

Harrison has found that one good thing about fishing off docks is that it seems to be more consistent even when there is a change in the weather -- you can usually catch something.

Like more and more dock crappie anglers, Harrison uses ultralight fishing gear, four-pound test line and jigs such as a swimming minnow. He often flips his jig along the edge of one of the slips and slowly swims it back with a jigging motion.

"When I used to live in the Kansas City area, I fished for crappie in the winter at Lake Jacomo, Blue Springs and Longview," Harrison said, "and I caught a lot of crappie, I would get up early and catch enough crappie for dinner before I headed to work. I had my favorite slips that would usually produce.

"One day, while fishing at Longview, I hooked a walleye on four-pound test line and it took a lot of maneuvering before I finally caught it."

The key to catching crappie off docks is simply use light tackle. I have seen anglers using gear they would use while fishing for bass or catfish and they may get hits, but don't even know it.