[piano intro] - That looks a little bit more substantial.

- Well, not a whole lot, but this is where they're hangin' in here.

- Ah, that's a decent fish.

- I think we're gonna lift 'em in.

- Beautiful.

- He's pretty, he's pretty.

- I think we outta hang tight pretty close here.

- Yeah, I'm not gonna slide away too far.

- I had slowed down my retrieve.

I was fishin' a little slower that time since you caught a fish then, I knew that's what we were callin' for.

I was kind of lettin' it.

- Right.

- I was keepin' there as long as I could.

- Carry him home.

Nice fish, nice fish.

Pretty work, sir.

- [male announcer]: The Carolina Outdoor Journal is brought to you by: - [female announcer]: "Wildlife in North Carolina" magazine has been delivering stunning photography and informative articles for more than 80 years.

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We fish from fresh to saltwater.

We provide fishing supplies and advice to every type of angler.

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[light instrumental music] ♪ ♪ ♪ - Hello, welcome to the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

Well today's program, you can call 'em crappie, you can call 'em croppie, but we called 'em crappie and croppie on a tough day, Joe.

- Yeah, John, this turned out to be a tough morning.

It was not a full day, it was a morning of fishing, but it was really tough.

And any fisherman sitting out here will know those days.

You go fishing and you have perfect water conditions, like conditions of the water are fine.

The clarity of the water was good.

Very little wind.

Partly cloudy conditions, see in and out sunshine.

Really a perfect day on the surface.

Now, I don't know what the fish were thinkin' that day 'cause it was not perfect for them, but we did, we targeted black crappie this day on the Neuse River, off and on the Neuse River.

First time we've actually targeted crappie on a river, believe it or not.

We've done lakes, we've done ponds, but never on a river.

The guys persevered.

We ended up catching a mess of fish, if you will, and but it was a tough day.

- It was a tough day.

We're gonna find out more about how we rigged for that day during Geartime today.

- That's right.

We're using light tackle, spin casts, spinning rods, small jigs, fishing shoreline.

Really a tough morning of fishing from that aspect, but we did catch fish.

- And we got a fish dip today?

- Coming from Donna, again, she always comes to the table with something new for us, so pay attention on this one.

- All right, we got a lot goin' on, so let's head down to the Neuse River today on the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

- [Kurt] This a pretty creek, Gary.

- [Gary] Yes, sir.

- [Kurt] First of May.

Been kind of a late spring, hasn't it?

- [Gary] It has, it has.

- [Kurt] Have you been catchin' some crappie in here pretty good?

- [Gary] Yeah, they've been pretty good in here.

This is sort of a typical spring pattern where the fish'll get in these slower movin' pieces of the river, mostly probably to spawn, but it makes a great place to target 'em.

It's a little bit shallower.

Don't have the current to deal with, and you know, they're in here pretty good.

- [Kurt] Do they bend up like a brim or not so much?

- [Gary] Yeah, they sure do, they sure do.

Water's startin' to warm up so we kind of started out slow.

Startin' to warm back up here a little bit so not sure if they're still beddin' or not, but they get in these places, they're plenty happy to eat while they're here, so.

- [Kurt] Well, good.

I've never really targeted crappie, so I'm gonna watch what you do, as usual.

- [Gary] Sounds good.

- [Kurt] All right.

- [Gary] We'll slide in here, work down this bank, throw some soft plastics in there and see what happens.

- [Kurt] Sounds good, I'm ready.

- [Gary] All right.

- [Kurt] Are these fish gonna be suspended along this bank?

Is there a bunch of cover in here we're gonna get hung up on?

- There's some cover.

The fish aren't gonna be real tight like they will be typically in a lake.

So mostly gonna be relatin' to the shore line, break the edges, kind of suspended off that edge a little bit.

And they can some days they're real tight to the bank, some days they're a little bit off, so you just kind of almost like we're trout fishin' or we're rock fishin', throw out towards the shore.

Kind of slowly work that jig back.

You can sort of slow roll it or jig it, let it fall.

Either method usually produces a bite.

- All right, is there a drop off down the bank somewhere?

- Yup, it's out about probably a foot, foot and a half it'll start to break just a little bit and as it comes off, about 10 feet it'll start to drop.

- I gotcha.

- We'll be in about six feet of water.

- The whole thing's a good ledge.

- Absolutely.

Every piece of the shore line can hold a fish.

(birds chirping) Little fish, little crappie.

Right species.

- [Kurt] It's the right species anyway.

- [Gary] Well, our first Neuse River black crappie of the morning.

- [Kurt] And he's a black, huh?

- [Gary] Mmm-hmm, sure enough.

- [Kurt] He's not real black for a black crappie, is he?

- Well, it's kind of interesting.

Even a white crappie, the males will get real black in the spring when they're spawning, but there's a couple ways to tell the difference.

The easiest way that I found is that black crappie doesn't have any bars.

So if you look at a white crappie, you see the barring in here.

This is, they're sort of speckled.

They're a little shorter in the nose and if you actually counted these out, there's seven to eight of these spines compared to a white crappie where there's only like four or five.

- Gotcha.

- That's the easiest way to tell.

- He's a healthy little fish, good and thick.

- Yeah, he is.

They eat real well here.

They grow quick.

Get him off here.

- You need these tweezers up here?

- Yeah, I think I might.

Did too good of a job settin' the hook on this one.

- There we go.

Drop him back, let him grow up.

- Well I got somethin' here.

- [Kurt] Look like a brim.

- It does look like a brim, doesn't it?

Well, one of the bad things about crappie fishing.

Well, no it isn't.

- [Kurt] No, this is a little crappie.

I saw some orange on him.

- [Gary] There you go.

- [Kurt] Look at his tail, a little ragged out down there.

Somethin' been bitin' on 'em or it's just fanned out from, - [Gary] Eh, it might've been from the nest.

You know?

- Uh-huh, usually the bottom edge, it almost look like.

- Yeah, eh, it's hard to say.

Nice little black.

Now they have to be eight inches.

Tanglin' you up.

See that'll keep you out of the game.

- Well it's been good so far.

Have to be how long?

- Be eight inches, and we're allowed 20 of 'em.

So about a nine-inch fish there.

Close to 10-inch fish, so.

I heard you wanted a couple for dinner.

- Yeah, if he's a good eatin' size, I'll just try a few.

I had never eatin' a crappie to my knowledge.

- They are wonderful eatin' fish.

They grow quick and they're plentiful.

You know, as a pan fish, as well.

And so it doesn't hurt them to harvest a few, either.

- Do you fillet 'em just like a trout or somethin'?

- [Gary] I do fillet 'em.

They scale easy or you can skin 'em.

And they're a mighty fine fried, I can tell you that.

- What's the best time of year to catch 'em on the bed like this?

- Well, your bed fishin', this spring time fishin', April and May is usually your best.

You'll see these fish just startin' to move up into these side creeks in March, but kind of peaks in April and into about mid-May.

- And we are pretty much fishin' fish on bed right now?

- Ah, yeah, they may be done by now, but it's about that time.

We got the water temperature, you know, upper '60s, low '70s.

But they kind of establish themselves in this creek prior to and after the bed, and then once the water warms up into the '80s, they'll push back out on that main river shore line.

- I wouldn't think this would be a crappie just for the fact that we saw him pop over there before.

- Well, you never know.

They've been known to.

- [Kurt] Of course, there could be a whole pile of 'em under there.

- [Gary] That's right.

Look at that, a brim.

- [Kurt] That's him.

Pretty brim, though, isn't it?

- [Gary] Yes, it is.

- [Kurt] I never knew the difference in the white crappie was the number of spines on 'em.

I never knew that.

- [Gary] Yup, sure enough.

- Lookin' at his set up like that.

He's a pretty fish.

Put him back.

- Barely get your hand around 'em.

Nothin' wrong with that at all.

- That's right.

(splashing) - Well, one of those things you do when you're back here crappie fishing.

You catch a brim, catch a bass, catch a perch.

- That's all right.

- It works.

They all pull.

It's a good time on these little rods, now.

- [Kurt] Ease him on, Gary.

But that's the second one I picked up over there.

- [Gary] That's nice.

That's a better crappie.

That looks good.

- [Kurt] Now just lift him in or I gotta net him?

- [Gary] Ah, you can probably lift him.

Probably come off now I said that.

Nice fish.

- [Kurt] Yeah, he's a pretty fish.

- [Gary] Yeah, absolutely.

Quality, nice shoulders on 'em.

- [Kurt] Mmm-hmm.

I believe I'll take him to dinner.

- [Gary] Absolutely.

You're libel to get likin' him so much, I might find you back in my crappie hole again.

- [Kurt] Well, let's hope not.

(laughing) About the finding me here part.

- [Gary] I hear ya.

(laughing) (mellow music) - [Kurt] Just caught one right in the middle here.

- [Gary] Ain't that somethin'?

- [Kurt] Well, them other ones we had told you they were off the back back yonder.

- [Gary] Well, they might've dropped back in deeper water for some reason.

- Maybe they have.

Hey, look at this.

See that black mark in the center of his bottom jaw?

- Ah, I see that.

- Is that normal on one of 'em?

- No, I've never seen that before.

Interesting.

- All right, just a special fish.

- [Gary] Yup.

- There's fish in this area, I think.

You know what I mean?

- Yeah, it just they may be deep, just not bitin' well, but they're here.

You keep catchin' 'em so that's good.

- Well.

In the process of trying to pattern these fish, we sure have fish to a bunch of different habitat, haven't we?

- There's no shortage of different pieces of structure to fish in the river here.

It's pretty amazing.

Lily pads, trees, stumps, ledges.

Hard part is tryin' to figure out which one they're not on.

- Too many of 'em, right?

- Absolutely.

But it certainly looks fishy, as they would say.

Right next to the boat.

The targeted species.

- [Kurt] I hear ya, good.

Good, good.

- [Gary] He hit that nice and hard.

- [Kurt] Did he?

- [Gary] He was a little bit farther out, almost hit the boat, but it was a good bite, so nice to see.

- [Kurt] Good.

- Wasn't gonna come unhooked anytime soon.

- [Kurt] Got 'em in there?

- Yeah, he's right through the hard part.

Right through the hard part.

- [Kurt] Need the tweezers?

- Got 'em.

- [Kurt] Got 'em.

- Well, workin' on a meal for ya.

- All right.

- This may be a little more substantial.

- [Kurt] Yeah.

- Crap, well, pickerel.

- [Kurt] You need to net 'em or ya?

- [Gary] Ah, I think I can get 'em.

He's not a giant one.

He's awful fun on this little stuff.

- [Kurt] Yeah.

A miniature muskie.

- [Gary] Yeah, just like pike fishin' except in hot water.

- [Kurt] Yeah.

(laughing) Well, they say he's the fish of 1000 casts.

- Well, we had about that on him, didn't we?

- [Kurt] Livin' up to his rep, isn't he?

- Yeah, he sure is.

He wasn't gonna come unhooked, I can tell you that.

Try not to get, there we go.

Nice little pickerel.

- [Kurt] Yeah, he is.

- Well, they're a lot of fun on this little stuff there, you know?

- [Kurt] Yeah, he was comin' out of the water.

I was hopin' he was a crappie.

- Yeah, you'd have some fillets in now.

It's gettin' a little close to lunch.

I'm hoping these fish are gettin' about as hungry as I am.

(laughing) - well, let's not eat 'til they do.

We'll tough 'em out.

- All right, that sounds good.

And the time of day usually doesn't make much of a difference.

Right now, in the winter, spring time, fall.

They're not all that particular.

It's harder to find 'em sometimes than it is to get 'em to eat.

Sometimes in the summertime now once this water gets warm, more you need then seems to be a little bit better, but I've caught plenty of fish right in the middle of the day.

In fact, a lot of times when we're fishin' for other fish, rock or something like that, you know you can come up after you got done doin' that, you can kind of work on these, on the pan fish.

- We just need to locate us a school.

- That's all we need.

That looks a little bit more substantial.

- [Kurt] Well, not a whole lot, but this is where they're hangin' in here.

- [Gary] Ah, that's a decent fish.

- [Kurt] I think we're gonna lift 'em in.

- [Gary] Beautiful.

- [Kurt] He's pretty, he's pretty.

I think we'll hang tight pretty close here.

- [Gary] Yeah, I'm not gonna slide away too far.

- I had slowed down my retrieve.

I was fishin' a little slower that time since you caught a fish then, I knew that's what we were callin' for.

I was kind of lettin' it.

- Right.

- I was keepin' it there as long as I could.

Carry him home.

- Nice fish, nice fish.

Pretty works here.

Well, another one right next to the boat here.

- [Kurt] Yeah.

- [Gary] Not very big again, but you got me on size here, brother.

You got me on size.

- [Kurt] Well, I'm hung up.

We'll just swing around the other side.

We know about where these fish have been.

We won't cut across that again.

You just keep fishin' and we'll get there.

- Well that was a terrible release, hey.

- [Kurt] Nice move.

- Thank you.

Advanced moves there from my youth.

(laughing) Well, not a giant, but it is the targeted species.

- [Kurt] That's about the same stretch we caught them other fish in, isn't it?

- Yeah, it is.

Little guy.

Put him back in the water.

- [Kurt] Isn't that about the same place we caught these other fish comin' out there?

- Yes, sir.

All right, see if we can't get a big one outta there.

- [Kurt] Nice one, yeah!

- [Gary] Well that'll work for your dinner.

- [Kurt] He's a nice fish.

- [Gary] He'll make for some mighty fine eatin' for ya.

Nice and broad, isn't he?

- Yeah, pretty fish.

- Yup, pretty, pretty.

Right in the, you know, we kind of alluded to this a little bit today, but it's not been the easiest bite even with that size of fish.

When he hits, he should jar that bait, and it just kind of got heavy.

As they say, it got soft.

And you know, nice fish.

All right, try to get another one here.

- Joe, you couldn't tell it, but it was pretty much a tough day.

It's almost like the fish decided to take that day off.

- Well, I think they did, most of 'em.

Yeah, we were fishin' a couple areas.

Gary had, they caught some really pretty, pretty, pretty black crappie, good size.

And he was talkin' about how good they fight on that light tackle.

In that particular morning we may have been experiencing a transition from some of these creeks back into the river itself from the spawning they'd done earlier.

We really don't know, but it was a lot of casting, and we moved around four or five times to catch the fish we did.

But hey, that's fishing and not catching.

- All right, let's go find out more.

Let's go to Geartime.

(mellow music) - Gary, we couldn't ask for a prettier day on the water.

Little bit of cloud cover to start with.

No wind, pretty day.

Just first of May, pretty day.

- Absolutely.

- But boy it was some tough fishin'.

- It was tough today.

- It was tough.

We looked hard for some fish and kept lookin', and while we were doing it we were coverin' a lot of water 'cause we're using basically the casting for crappie.

That was our initial plan to start with.

Both of us using ultralight, lightweight rods.

You had braid on yours.

I like that.

No closer when where I had on, just straight mono, it was fine.

Eighth-ounce jig heads.

I think that's all we varied from so it could get to the bottom, 'cause in the places we fished, sometimes we'd be fishin' three feet, sometimes we saw water 15 feet deep, lettin' it sink.

We couldn't have done without that much weight, I don't think.

- You need that weight and I think the other thing, you know, it's real basic setup, but the lighter wire, you know, these lesser expensive, lighter wire hooks.

You know, a lot of times you snag up, they'll straighten out and pull up for ya.

- That's only an option for braid and that worked.

- Right.

- We went to a lot of snags that I had because I didn't have a chance to break it off, but I kept chuckin' when I thought there was fish.

- Very true.

Pretty simple plastics.

Just a small two, three-inch twister tail.

Color doesn't seem to much matter.

You know, somethin' bright, white, chartreuse, pinks.

- Let's hope it didn't matter today.

We never deviated which we probably should have.

- We threw whites and we caught a few fish, anyway.

We got your dinner.

- Yeah, got enough fish for dinner and I think the way we did that was just straight up perseverance.

We kept lookin' for a pattern on this fish.

We kept fishin' different places.

We kept movin' where you had caught fish before and never quit.

Covered a lot of area, more than you would have if you were just fishin' with cane poles at a treetop or somethin'.

I think that was the key to us bringin' home the bacon.

- Absolutely, absolutely.

You know, and along with that you mentioned the rods, but spendin' a little bit extra money when you're doing this, having a quality graphite rod, increase that sensitivity performance, feel a few of those extra bites, take a few extra fish out.

- [Kurt] Absolutely.

You need to have something you can feel with.

Even with that light head throwin' at it, you need to be able to feel it.

Sometimes I'd hear you say I'm not even to the bottom yet or you know, it's drifting, and we could even tell the depth by that.

But that's right, we could feel when the fish bit.

And like I said, it was just perseverance.

We stayed in there and kept fishin'.

It was a good day.

It was a good day.

You can't catch 'em all every day.

- That's the truth.

- That's why they call it fishin', and today we done a lot of that.

- We did a lot of fishing.

- I enjoyed it.

As always being with you, and it was just a little different being here, fresh water.

Pretty, just pretty scenery.

Saw a lot of game and I appreciate you havin' me.

- Always a pleasure.

- It was a pleasure.

- Always a pleasure, thank you.

- Gary, thank you for that information.

Now if you want to go fishin' for crappie on the Neuse River, give Gary a call.

His number's right there on your screen.

Now, let's catch up with Donna.

She's in the kitchen.

She's got a recipe today.

It's called smoked fish dip.

[light instrumental music] ♪ ♪ ♪ - Hey, today in the kitchen we're making a smoked fish dip.

Now, I have been eating at different seafood places around and I've noticed the seafood dip, and it is so good.

And I was like, I have got to be able to make this, so we're gonna make some smoked seafood dip right now.

This is a great, great thing.

And maybe you've had it before.

We're going to add some cream cheese to our food processor.

Whoops.

And make it sure it's soft.

You want to soften that up.

We're gonna add some jalapenos, two jalapenos.

We're gonna add some old bay spices.

Some mayonnaise.

And you can use a blender for this as well if you want, depending on what you have.

Then we're gonna add about eight ounces of smoked trout.

You can use smoked trout, you can use smoked whitefish.

Maybe you smoke your own after you've caught it and cleaned it.

Maybe you do your own.

When you can use that, too.

So we're just gonna place this all into the food processor bowl, and then we're just gonna pulse this until it's nice and smooth and creamy, and that is all you do.

Quick and easy.

Isn't that great?

And it makes such a great little appetizer.

Something you can keep in your fridge.

If you want a little snack at your desk or if you have guests that come over spontaneously, you can always just whip out your smoked fish dip.

So quick and easy.

So this is what it looks like when it's done.

This is what I'm serving mine with.

I have my smoked dip on my fish plate.

I have some crackers.

We're gonna use some cherry tomatoes.

Some little fun carrots that you can buy in the store already done.

They're already peeled, but are really cute.

You can use celery if you'd like.

You can put it on crackers.

You can put it on a sandwich, if you like.

So I hope you enjoy the smoked fish dip and I look forward to seeing you next time here on Simple Cooking.

- Thank you, Donna, for another great recipe.

That's one of those you just gotta try.

Joe, tough day, interesting day on the Neuse River.

- It was, and again, you could tell it was a really nice day on the surface condition-wise, which every fishermen loves to have.

And everybody that's fished knows that some days you just, you do everything right, you have all the right conditions, and the fish just don't want to cooperate.

But Gary's got a really good black crappie fishery on the Neuse River there that he counts on every spring and catches some really pretty fish.

And I want to thank him and Kurt for really stickin' to it that day.

But that's fishing.

Some days you do everything right and you catch a lot of fish, some days you don't.

And we just stuck it out and caught a mess of fish that day.

- [John] A mess of fish.

Another great day in North Carolina.

- Absoutely.

- For Joe Albea, I'm John Moore.

We thank you for joining us today on the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

- [male announcer]: Make sure to visit our website for more information.

- [male announcer]: The Carolina Outdoor Journal is brought to you by: - [female announcer]: "Wildlife in North Carolina" magazine has been delivering stunning photography and informative articles for more than 80 years.

- [male announcer]: And by EZ Bait & Tackle.

Family owned and operated.

We fish from fresh to saltwater.

We provide fishing supplies and advice to every type of angler.

For all your fishing needs, EZ Bait & Tackle.

- And by contributions from PBS North Carolina viewers like you.

[light instrumental music] ♪ ♪ ♪