“Fall Fishing with Shane Anderson and Brad Whitehead and the Mister Mino at Pickwick, Bear Creek and Wilson Lakes”

Part 3: Vertical Jig for September Slabs

Editor’s Note: Brad Whitehead of Muscle Shoals, Alabama, guides on Pickwick, Wilson and the Bear Creek Lakes on the Tennessee River.

Question: Brad, why do you vertical jig in late August and September?

Whitehead: I vertical jig in the summertime and in September and fish the stake beds I’ve put out. I like to keep my skill level up on finding the crappie and catching them with a hand-held B’n’M pole in deep water. In the middle of the day, when the crappie move into deep structure and hold tight there, you can pick them out of that structure using a B’n’M pole and a 1/16-ounce jig.

Question: What rod, reel and line do you use for vertical jigging?

Whitehead: I prefer to use the 10-foot B’n’M Buck’s Ultimate Rod with a B’n’M reel on 8-pound-test Vicious line.

Question: Why do you like a 10-foot rod for vertical jigging?

Whitehead: With the 10-foot rod, I don’t have to sit right on top of the crappie to catch them. I can stay at least 10-feet away from the structure and fish all the way around it without being right on top of the crappie. The crappie never will know I’m there. Sometimes the crappie won’t be right on top of this structure but may be off to the side or above the structure. So, if you position your boat right over the top of a piece of structure, the crappie may be holding behind you or directly under you.I like to stay away from the crappie with a longer pole to have a little more room to fish and to be able to fish the structure more thoroughly. If you use a short pole, you’ll have to hold your boat just above the structure.

Question: When you’re vertical jigging, how deep is the water you’re fishing?

Whitehead: The water is rarely deeper than 20 feet. I’ve found that you can’t vertical jig for crappie effectively in water much deeper than 20 feet.

Question: What size jig do you use?

Whitehead: I like to fish a 1/4-ounce jighead with a Mister Mino. Silver flake and black/chartreuse are the most-productive colors for me.

Question: How do you know the crappie are on the stake beds you’re fishing?

Whitehead: I’ll see the crappie on my depth finder before I start fishing a piece of structure. I can tell whether or not the fish will bite by the relationship of the crappie to the cover.For instance, if the crappie are holding tight to the cover or down in the cover, they’re more likely to bite than if they are concentrating on the sides of the cover. When I bang my jig into the cover, and the crappie are holding tight to the cover, I get more bites than when the jig falls, and the crappie take the bait on the fall.

Question: How do you keep your jig from getting hung in the wood?

Whitehead: The stake beds I build only will have about eight stakes sticking-up off the bottom. I’ve found that fishing’s easier and you hang-up less fishing a stake bed than fishing a brush pile made of treetop. Too, the smaller my stake beds, the bigger the crappie I’ll catch on these stake beds. I have a stake-bed frame that builds beds 24-inches long and 24-inches wide, and I build them eight stakes high.

Question: In a day of fishing stake beds, how many crappie do you generally catch?

Whitehead: Because I’m fishing vertically and not covering as much water as I do when I’m spider rigging, a good day of fishing stake beds will produce 20 to 30 crappie.However, the crappie I catch off the stake beds are slightly bigger than the crappie I’ll take trolling. I’ll often catch 13- to 15-inch crappie on my stake beds.

For more information on fishing with Brad Whitehead on Lake Wilson, Pickwick, Wheeler and Bear Creek lakes, call (256) 381-7231 or email bradandalicia09@comcast.net.