2023 Family Crappie Fishing Vacation - April 10-13 2023

Little Bear / Cedar Creek Reservoir

April 10-13, 2023

Air Temperature: Lows around 45 degrees, Highs 70-78 Degrees

Lake Level: 579.42 - 5879.9

Weather Conditions: Mostly Sunny, moderate winds. 

April 10th, Monday

This year my brother-in-law, Daniel, and my Dad joined me at the cabin at Elliot's branch.  (https://bearcreeklakes.com/)

We were ready to hit the water around 1:00ish and decided to maximize fishing time, we'd just fist Little Bear this afternoon.  This was only my 2nd time on the water, but figured it was worth a shot.  The weather was gorgeous and we had a good time riding around, but we struggled to get on fish.  It was probably around 3:00 when we finally found a few scattered crappie.  We were primarily fishing treetops with minnows under a bobber, although I tried casting a jig also with no luck.  I think we ended the day with about 8 crappie caught but only 3 keepers. We called it a day and had some fantastic burgers and hotdogs for dinner 

April 11th, Tuesday

We launched at Britton Bridge at Cedar Creek around 8:30 and set out looking for crappie up in the bushes.  We had a slow morning in the shallows so decided to try fishing deeper structure.  That was the ticket.  They were biting black/yellow and white/chartreuse jigs pretty well.  We were tipping with tuffies too in most cases.  We put several good fish in the boat until it seemed all we were catching were smalls.  At this point, we moved back into the shallows and begin catching fish with minnows under a bobber as the shallows warmed up.  We picked up most of our fish in just 2 locations, but caught a few fish just  about every where we went.  We ended up catching 27 crappie with 21 of them large enough to keep.  We spent the entire day fishing around the Britton Bridge area.  It was a great day and we headed back to the cabin for a fish fry.

April 12th, Wednesday

After figuring out what worked yesterday, we decided to hit deep structure immediately.  We got on the water at about 8:00 and went to work.  It was a good plan and we immediately begin pulling in fish with jigs.  After a while, the fish got small and we moved to the shallows like we did the previous day, but fish were scattered and much difficult to find.  After a long dry spell around lunch, we decided to head toward the dam and fish some deeper structure.  Unfortunately after getting to our target area, it was covered up in boat traffic so we were forced to changed tactics again.  After only picking up a couple strays, we head to the Lost Creek area and fish boat docks and inlets.  This was a good change and produced another 5-6 keepers.  We left as the day got late and stopped at a couple spots around Britton Bridge to see if activity has picked up in some honey holes, but it had not.  We finished the day with 21 crappie with 13 large enough to keep.  Time for a steak dinner!

April 13th, Thursday

Dad decided to head back in early but Daniel and I planned to fish.  We cleaned out the cabin and checked out but as we did, a big storm system moved in.  Although we might could have waited it out or fished through, we'd had a great couple days so decided to call it and all head home.

We had a fantastic time and are already planning for next year.  I believe we ended the trip with 56 crappie caught and 37 keepers.  Dad and Daniel both took home about 4 pounds of crappie.  

2021 Cedar Creek Guys Trip

Cedar Creek Reservoir Guys Trip
April 15 - 18, 2021

Daniel McGovern
Ronny Watkins
Eric Watkins

We started what I hope is a new tradition this year.  Back around Christmas, I pitched an idea to have a spring crappie fishing trip to my dad and brother-in-law and they were all it.  We coordinated a few days vacation in mid-April centered around the spawn and made it a plan.

Dad came up on Wednesday afternoon and we did some grocery shopping a packing.  Daniel came up on Thursday morning and we hit the road for a 11:30 AM target time.

April 15 2021

We booked a cabin from BCDA Elliott Branch (http://www.bearcreeklakes.com/elliott-branch.html) and checked in right on time.  This was my first time dealing with the BCDA cabins and I was a little nervous about the location and amenities, but once we got there, we realized it was the perfect setup.  The cabins are very nice and had absolutely everything we needed.  We got everything unpacked and settled in and made some sandwiches and prepared to hit the water. 

We stopped by CJ's and got some tuffies and made it to Britton Bridge landing at 1:00 PM.  We set about to fish my normal places and techniques starting with the south side of the bank near the boat landing.  The temperature was in the mid 60's with a high of 67 and the winds were about 10 MPH from the N/NW.  It was sunny and beautiful and the water temperature was around 68 in the shallows.  We began floating tuffies under a bobber in the shallows and BOOM! crappie on the 1st cast! 

We fished heavy around the landing, levee, pumphouse, and on the blow down past the bridge all evening and had a solid day.  We finished with 29 crappie caught with 14 being keepers.  We also caught a bluegill, rock bass, and largemouth.  Very good day considering we launched a 1:00.

We headed back to the cabin and I cleaned fish while Daniel and Dad cooked dinner.  Daniel made some smash burgers and hot dogs that rocked.  After dinner, we were all exhausted and hit the sack early.

April 16 2021

We were all up around 6 AM and cooked sausage, biscuits, and eggs for breakfast.  We headed back out shortly after 7:00AM on Friday and started off with the same tactics as the day before.  However, the temperature had dropped substantially overnight and a cold front was blowing in.  The water temperature dropped about 5 degrees overnight with the lows getting down into the 40's and cloud cover set in for the entire day.  The high was only about 64 degrees.  This made our tactics from the day before much less effective.  We pulled a couple out of the shallows, but it started off very slow.  The fish we were catching were also much smaller.  We moved around a great deal and the fish were scattered.  We caught a few early, but went into a tremendous dry spell through the middle of the day.  

It was pretty obvious that the fish had pull back some from the shallows.  We couldn't find them in the deeper blowdowns on the bank either.  By middle afternoon, we decided to change our approach entirely and we found some submerged structure in the little bay where I normally fish with the blowdown past the bridge.  This structure was completely submerged in about 8-12 FOW.  We set up the Livescope and switched over to jigs.  The crappie started hitting immediately!  It seemed the key to the colder weather with the cold front moving in.  

We ended the day with 16 crappie caught and 10 keepers.  Daniel caught one bluegill big enough to keep.  We also caught 2 largemouth and one rock bass. While it was much slower, we still had a great time and had a good game plan ready for Saturday morning.

We went back to the cabin and I cleaned fish again while Dad and Daniel cooked.  We fried some of the fish we caught from the previously day and was absolutely stuffed! 

April 17 2021

We got up about 6:30AM and cooked another fabulous breakfast - deer tenderloin, sausage, biscuits, and eggs.  We hit the water shortly after 7:30AM and started the day with a plan to fish deeper water and fully submerged structure.  This day was much like the previous with heavy cloud cover and highs in the mid 60's.  The water temperature never recovered and stayed around 63 to 64 degrees.  

We started out were we finished the previous day past the bridge fishing structure in 8-12 FOW with jigs and we were immediately getting bites.  We pulled several out but overall, the size of the fish was very small.  We motored around the mouths of the bays and coves scanning and marking structure.  

We were all amazed that every single submerged structure spot we marked and fished held crappie.  We probably did this 10 different times and caught fish every time.  However, all fish coming out of deep structure were very small.  We realized later in the afternoon while fishing out towards the dam end of the lake that the small fish must be immature and would not move up to spawn.  Therefore, they had no need to leave the deeper structure.  

This would be our final afternoon of fishing, so we hit up the boat docks and some of the most promising shallow spots and managed to pull in a few keepers.  The bigger fish wanted to be shallow, but the wind got up to around 10 MPH NW and the combination of the cooler water and the muddy, windy wave action made shallows tough.  Still, we had a much more successful day that the previous since we had come into it with a better game plan.  We ended the day with 22 crappie, but only 4 keepers. Daniel also caught a nice channel catfish under the boat docks and we kept that one too.  

We headed back to the cabin and I cleaned fish while Dad and Daniel cooked.  Daniel cooked some killer ribeye steaks on charcoal.  

April 18 2021

Week took Sunday as a day of rest and cooked a good sausage, egg, and toast breakfast and packed up and got ready for checkout.  Overall, I believe we caught 65 crappie with 28 of them keepers.  We also had a mixed bag of other fish (bluegill, largemouth, rock bass, catfish). We had an outstanding time and a much needed break.  I can't wait to hit it again next year.