Director Jay Don Reeve (left) and James Raines, first place winner at the 11th Annual Crappiefest this past weekend at Lake Fork. Photo by Luke Clayton

By Luke Clayton
Outdoors writer

The weather was picture perfect for the 11th annual Crappiefest held at Lake Fork and headquartered at the beautiful newly constructed Caney Point Recreational Area Just off Highway 154.

Eleven years ago, Jay Don Reeve and his wife Rhonda began this annual tournament with the goal to raise money to fight ovarian cancer and provide a fun, well-organized big fish tournament that is open to anyone that wishes to fish from the bank, off a dock or in a boat.

The event has grown each year into one of the biggest crappie tournaments in the state and after spending several hours visiting with all the fine folks here, I’d add that it’s the best, a tournament that truly can be won by anyone lucky enough to hook and land a big crappie and that includes kids which I am happy to say were present in large numbers.

Each kid present received a free tackle box stuffed with tackle and winners received a trophy and new crappie rod. I wish we had room here to include all the photos of smiling kids weighing in their fish.

My friends Larry Weishuhn, Jeff Rice and I attended the event, and although Reeve and I have been friends for years, this was my first time attending. Through the years, I’ve been present and competed in several catfish and bass tournaments but never have I attended one that was as well received or planned as Crappiefest.

My hat is truly off to Jay Don, his family and friends that put many hours of hard work into making this event the success that it is.

James Rains was the first-place winner with a big crappie weighing 2.44 pounds and Steve Shield also landed a barndoor that matched that weight exactly. Jerry Hancock and John Maddox each landed crappie weighing 2.43 pounds, which was as close as one can get to first place.

The tournament rule is that in case two crappie of equal weight are weighed in, the first is the winner. There can only be one first-place winner in any event but to my way of thinking everyone that attended was a winner.

Another way the tournament pays out money is by exact weight, $500 is paid to the first person weighing in a crappie that tips the scales at exactly 1, 1.25, 1.75 or 2 pounds. It would be hard to top spending a beautiful early spring day in the company of great folks on a lake that is heralded as one of the best crappie fisheries in the southwest.

Jeff Rice was busy filming a segment of the weekly outdoor show that he, Larry Weishuhn and I produce for Carbon TV. “A Sportsman’s Life” also is archived on YouTube each week. I was busy visiting with friends and gathering information for this great newspaper.

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Although Larry “Mr. Whitetail” is well known as a hunting personality, I watched him cover the event with his cameras and interviews like the pro media man he is. I’ve had the pleasure to fish quite a bit with Larry, he likes fishing almost as much as he does hunting.

Both of us are somewhat old school and consider a successful fishing trip to end when the fillets are dusted in cornmeal and dropped into hot cooking oil.

Reeve has for many years been involved with Crappie Anglers of Texas (www.crappieanglersoftexas.com), which hosts tournaments throughout the year on lakes know for great crappie fishing. The way to learn about any endeavor is to associate oneself with those with more experience, and Reeve says through the years, CAT has help educate many novice anglers on crappie catching methods not only in the tournaments but seminars and shared information among members.

Fishing methods in this tournament varied greatly. Driving in, we spotted many anglers fishing from the bank and at the weigh in, there were boats rigged with everything from power poles to state of the art electronics. Some were dunking minnows along the bank under corks while others were using spot lock on their electronics to position their boats directly over fish, they could watch on the screen of their Livescope while others fished from 14-foot jon boats with 20 HP kickers.

The really cool thing about this tournament is the fact that it could just as easily been won by a first-time angler that barely knew how to rig his live minnow to the guy with an $80,000 boat with all the bells and whistles.

I visited with several contestants and learned that some fish were caught in very shallow water while many reported their best action was in water 12 to 15 feet deep with fish holding close to bottom. The crappie spawn usually begins in March each year, depending upon weather but not all fish move into the shallows at the same time.

The spawn is actually a drawn-out event with some fish up shallow spawning, some staging at intermediate depths about to move shallow and some post spawn fish that are moving out to deeper water.

For 14 years I did an in-depth fishing tips column for the largest newspaper in the state. I always dreaded reporting crappie fishing during the spawn because of the varied conditions fish were being caught. As sure as I gave a report from a pro such as “most fish are coming from the edge of vegetation in water as shallow as 2 feet on one eight ounce white/chartreuse jigs,” I would have to respond to a reader that swore he hadn’t caught a fish shallow in over a week but live minnows were “tearing them up in 12 feet around submerged brush.”

I’ve always said that crappie can be the most challenging of fish to catch — or the easiest. Tournaments such as the one this past week end and organizations such as Crappie Anglers of Texas is a great way to share crappie catching knowledge.

We’ve come a long way from when I was a boy and the only way we knew to catch crappie was to drop that minnow down to bottom and fish increments of five feet until we found the fish. Back then I truly believed that every crappie in the lake or pond was holding at exactly the same depth. Boy, have we learned a lot since the old days.

Contact outdoors writer Luke Clayton through his website www.catfishradio.org. Watch “A Sportsman’s Life” on Carbon TV (www.carbontv.com) or YouTube.