Hell yeah I skunked!! I went in half on $60 bucks and fished a tournament I knew nothing about. Spent another $50 bucks in gas and another $25 bucks on jigs. Lost a bunch of lures, skuffed up my boat and broke a rod. But I could have stayed home and waited until next month when it is easier to catch them and I could quit fishing stripers until next month when it's easier to catch them too.

Look on the bright side Billy, at least it wasn't WINDY

Yeah Brett, That's how I skuffed up the sided of my boat. If I was a crappie fisherman I would deffinately purchase the I-Pilot for the spot lock feature.

Y'all heard me right the first time. "Croppy and strippers!" It's an inside thing...

The weigh-in was pretty cool. The big fish was won by .05 pds...that's close!

If only you would have had the I-Pilot, you would have won the crappie tournament. Either that or some actual experience crappie fishing. One of the two would have put you in good position to win.

What I mean when I say "easy", is that you can target the bank lines with structure. Basically, minnows and bobbers or little jigs and bobbers. To me, that's crappie fishing. Shooting docks is for the fellars that know how to do so. If I'm not mistaken, it is against the rules (during the tournament) to get off the boat and onto a dock to fish it. Wonder how many people broke that rule? I can think of one boat that cheated like hell, but I won't name any names. They didn't win anyway.

I'm just glad that Lionel got to experience what I have to go thru.

I fished the tournament last Sat (had a good time). The weights were not too good as the big fish were not biting. We probably caught 80 fish in total, but only one over a lb. I think we were 4th or 5th place with several boats in the 5-6 lb range for 7 fish. Next month I think the weights will be in the 8-9 lb range, We will see. A couple of years ago, in the Crappie.com tournament, there were weights at 10-11 lbs in a March tournament...
There were a few really good crappie anglers in the tournamnet that know Lake Lanier as well as anyone and for sure can catch crappie under about any conditions.
It seems that the crappie are starting to stage as we caught fish 25 ft deep over deep water and 4 ft down over shallow water. One of the trollers was in less than 6 feet of water at time (he won it). Could not catch a fish over brush. All of my fish came under docks on jigs and minnows.
Remember to respect dock owners by staying off their docks if you are fishng around them - a fast way to draw unwanted attention to some of the known hotspots this spring. Last year I had one dock owner come down and take pictures of me and my boat. Said he was tired of fishermen getting off on his dock and having things stolen. I was a little shocked as I never touched his dock, but saw a group standing on his dock the next day and fishing like they owned it. I then understood his attitude.
Take care,
Alan

Corey,
Cheating is fightin' words. Do you mean they got off the boat and fished on a dock, or that they cheated?
There was no mention in the rules about getting out of the boat on a dock. If I had a dock, or have permission to fish on a dock, there should be no reason that I can't get off. How was someone cheating?

The rules did state " No getting out of your boat" to fish docks!! I am a fighter and cheating will get your boat boarded real quick. When I submit money to fish a tournament and find out someone cheated and stole my money then someone........Well just do it and find out!!!!!!!!!

There is no reason you shouldn't be able to get off on a dock, but one of the tournament rules is that you can't. Review the rules of the crappie tournaments and if you don't like some of them, argue them with the folks that can change them.

There is as good a chance as any that I won't ever fish any of the crappie tournaments, so it doesn't matter to me what the rules are. But, I do know the crappie guys like getting onto folks' docks.

Good luck with the next one.

Corey, You and I are fishing the next tournament together.