Mike Giles caught this crappie out of the grass while fishing with his brother Joe. 

Easing up to the grass patch we let the boat drift slowly until it was resting against the tall stalks of grass and started dropping candy over into the grass. The candy in this case was Bass Pro Shops crappie jigs and grubs sometimes tipped with Berkley Crappie Nibbles.

Wham! Joe Giles put his crappie candy right into the perfect spot and a slab perch thumped it hard. Giles

Joe Giles put his crappie candy right into the perfect spot and a slab perch thumped it hard. Giles

Giles quickly set the hook and pried him right out of the salad patch and into the boat. Our first crappie was in hand but it wasn’t to be the last. Giles caught several more and it wasn’t long before I joined in on the fun and started jerking a few perch myself.

We’ve been jerking perch out of the salad patch and willow brakes for nigh on to 45 years now and J. P. Nolen’s technique is still as good today as it was back when he taught us how to catch them on Ross Barnett. We were too young to know we weren’t supposed to catch crappie like that every time we went fishing. But catch them we did!

As we combed the grass and weeds the crappie kept thumping those jigs and we kept connecting and picking them out one by one. Most of crappie wanted the jigs motionless right near the bottom. Black and chartreuse and red and chartreuse were the ticket on this day. We kept dancing a jig and they kept on striking our tempting offerings.

There’s nothing much better than eating some perch fillets fried crisp and golden brown right out of the water. They’re always better when you cook them before freezing them, but they’re pretty good any time you can get them and that’s why I put up a freezer full for the rest of the year.

The perfect jig pole is 11 to 12 feet long, made of carbon or graphite and light as a feather. No heavy reel is needed just something to hold a few extra feet of line if you break off. When we’re fishing in the grass or bushes we’re typically fishing from 18- inches to four feet deep and we like to probe the grass and work the jig slowly around, over and into each patch of grass until we find a pattern.

Sometimes they’re in the top of the grass and will bite as soon as they see it. Other times you have to drop it down and jig it up a time or two before they’ll strike. I prefer the eight-pound gold colored monofilament or the lightweight braid.

You can see the gold color and detect strikes very easily as a result. If you get hung up simply grab your line with one hand, run the rod tip all the way to the jig and push it off the brush. We rarely lose a jig when we take it easy and do it that way.

This year the shallow water bite has been up and down as the water goes up and falls back down.

Crappie have bitten in the shallow water from February right up until now. Sometimes the wind, rain or cold has affected the bite a bit but they have continued to come to the grass to spawn and feed. If the water is in the grass there’s sure to be a few baitfish and crappie around until the water gets too hot to suit them.

Call Mike Giles at 601-917-3898 or email mikegiles18@comcast.net.