“I hate fishing the summer,” Charles Lindsay said, “but I know it can be some of the best fishing of the year, so I go when I feel like I can handle the heat.
“But I fish the same way I usually do, and that’s pushing minnows. I use six poles across the front of my boat, which has two seats up front. We often have to reduce the number of poles to keep up.”
• Tackle — Lindsay uses 14-foot B&M Pro Staffs rigged with light spinning reels. His line of choice is 12-pound Gold Stren “because it is strong enough that I can pull it and straighten a hook if I hang a stump. The color I use so I can always see my line and how it’s behaving.”
• Hooks — Lindsay is particular about his hooks, always using the Eagle Claw 202EL in No. 1.
“It’s an extra-light gold hook, and I like that,” he said. “There’s also an EL212 and it’s bronze, but I prefer the gold.”
He uses two hooks to the line, one about a foot above a 1/2-ounce sinker and the other 2 or 3 feet above the sinker.
• Minnows — “I always use a medium minnow,” Lindsay said. “They will not take a big minnow in the summer, and I don’t like small minnows on the hook like that.
• Technique — “Mainly, I’m working contour changes, what most people refer to as ledges. I like to fish the edge of the river channel, too.
“But one of the things I do that most trollers won’t do is fish deep flats — you know 10 to 12 or even 14 feet deep with stumps. On a steady barometer crappie will move up to chase shad on those flats. They will be aggressive fish, that’s for sure, because they are going there to feed.
“I try to push about .9 to 1 mph, but you can pick up the pace a bit if they are on the flats.
“My shallowest hook will always be 6 feet and the deepest 12, so I have two rods at 6 to 8 feet, two more 8 to 10 feet and two more 10 to 12 feet. Never ever will I have one over 12 feet deep in the summer.
“Of course, if I start catching all my fish at one depth, I adjust everything to that depth.”
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