Crappie hide, anglers seek at Beaver Lake

Carnes shows a black crappie he caught on May 8 2020 near Horseshoe Bend park. The angler caught both black and white crappie during his fishing day. Black crappie display more of a spotted pattern while the pattern on white crappie is more striped. (NWA Democrat-Gazette/Flip Putthoff)
Carnes shows a black crappie he caught on May 8 2020 near Horseshoe Bend park. The angler caught both black and white crappie during his fishing day. Black crappie display more of a spotted pattern while the pattern on white crappie is more striped. (NWA Democrat-Gazette/Flip Putthoff)

Anglers on safari for springtime crappie at Beaver Lake beat the bushes in their quest to get a bite from these tasty panfish.

Fishermen like Bob Carnes of Rogers also pound toppled trees, stumps and underwater branches that are the lairs of cover-loving crappie. The trophies of a spring crappie hunt fin gently in the livewells of their boats. That's especially true this year.

Carnes, 77, has been fishing at Beaver Lake since it filled in the 1960s. This could be the best spring ever for catching crappie at the reservoir, Carnes testified. The numbers he's caught are high, and the average size is big.

On a sun-splashed May 8, Carnes plucked another 13-inch crappie from a little cove at Horseshoe Bend park. It was fish number, oh, who knows. He'd quit counting long before catching this hefty one.

"This is about the average size we've been catching this year," he said, admiring the plate-sized crappie. "To tell you the truth, these are some of the best crappie I've seen come out of this lake. If a man doesn't like catching crappie like this, he'd better just go to the house."

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High water in the lake over four consecutive years created excellent spawning conditions for crappie, Carnes said. Anglers are reaping the benefits this spring, catching the fire out of crappie and big ones, too. Carnes' largest this spring is a whopper 16-inches.

"They've consistently run 13- to 14 inches. That's some good crappie no matter where you are," he said.

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Carnes started his fishing trip with some undercover work on that chilly, windy Friday. His first stop was a freshly fallen cedar tree in a cove across the lake from Horseshoe Bend park. Carnes probed its prickly boughs, lowering a jig vertically over the side of his boat right into the branches. The tactic yielded three keeper-sized crappie. Crappie must be 10 inches or longer to keep at Beaver Lake. The daily limit is 15.

"Oh we'll find some bigger than these," he assured.

Carnes fired up his outboard and bounced across the choppy lake. A 20 mph north wind whipped the water to a froth of whitecaps. Carnes ducked into a quiet cove, an oasis from the cold wind next to one of Horseshoe Bend's campgrounds.

Crappie jigs are his lure of choice. Solid chartreuse or solid gray are good colors. A box on the deck of his boat was filled with jigs of every color combination, with some chartreuse in most of the patterns.

A 1/16th-ounce jig is his favorite size. He'll use a heavier jig if it's windy to get the jig to the bottom quickly. His reels are spooled with 2-pound or 4-pound test line.

Carnes spent most of his day in the cove, catching one big crappie after another. Bushes, branches and floating logs all got the angler's attention.

Fish weren't biting just any jig, but a jig the fisherman designed himself. Carnes owns Arkie Lures in Springdale, and the Shineee Hineee crappie jig is a top seller for his company.

Carnes stared making them in the 1970s. A tiny length of tinsel, like Christmas tree tinsel, is on the back side of the jig to give it some extra fish-attracting flash.

Back then, the lure started catching crappie at Beaver Lake right away, before Carnes decided on its funny name.

To hear Carnes tell the story, a women's bass fishing club and a men's club enjoyed a good-natured rivalry. Now and then some mooning started going on among the guys and gals out there on the water. Carnes and his fishing buddy, the late Huland Nations, were on the receiving end of some of the shenanigans.

"One day, we were headed out to fish," Carnes recalled, "and Huland said 'I wonder whose shiny hiney we'll see today.' Soon as he said that I knew I had the name."

Carnes changed the spelling to Shineee Hineee so it would pass muster with the big box stores that sold fishing tackle. Today, it's a favorite for crappie fishing at Beaver Lake and around the nation.

The original Shineee Hineee jigs Carnes made in the 1970s didn't have eyes painted on them like the ones sold today. Carnes still carries some of those originals in his boat.

Arkie Lures sells a ton of the jigs, especially this spring. An economy in recession now is similar to a downturn in the 1980s when Carnes pondered going into the tackle industry full time. The economy worried him.

Some advice from a Missouri friend in the wholesale tackle business helped him decide to make the leap.

"He told me there's two things that aren't affected by a recession -- alcohol sales and sporting goods," Carnes remembered.

"We're busier now than we've been in four years," he said.

It's been a memorable 2020 for Carnes. Not only has he been sacking up impressive catches of crappie, he won the first Beaver Lake Elite Series bass tournament of the season held on March 7. It was the first tournament Carnes had fished in 15 years.

"I think I was the oldest dog there. My main objective was just not to get embarrassed," Carnes said. The series attracts the lake's best bass fishermen. He decided to fish the tournament like he did during contests in the 1980s -- swimming a black and red bucktail jig.

When the scoring was through, Carnes was the winner with five bass totaling 18 pounds.

Tournament Director James Whittle said Carnes basked in enthusiastic applause, whoops and hollers from the young-buck anglers. Most are half his age.

"He was the star," Whittle said. "Bob comes to our weigh-ins even if he doesn't fish just to socialize and talk to everybody."

Carnes will try for another win when the Elite Series resumes its tournaments, hopefully on June 20. For now, a crappie rod and some Shineee Hineees will be on the deck of his boat.

Catch a mess

Crappie are a fish of catch and keep for most anglers. The panfish are among the tastiest in fresh water.

Regulations vary at lakes around the Ozarks. At Beaver Lake, crappie must be 10 inches or longer to keep. The daily limit is 15.

Rubber tube jigs or hair jigs are good lures to use. Small minnows are the top live bait.

Source: Staff report

Sports on 05/26/2020

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