Crappies are found throughout Indiana, and there are plenty of public lakes that offer outstanding crappie fishing and good infrastructure to support anglers fishing from boats and from shore. Some of these Hoosierland public lakes are good enough crappie hotspots that they have attracted the attention of the American Crappie Association (ACA). Moreover, the ACA has put several Hoosierland lakes on its tournament list -- and that is a good thing!

The ACA is a great organization that arranges, conducts and manages crappie tournaments throughout the country. The events held in Indiana are actually qualifying events in the ACA’s Region 3 for the Super Bowl of competitive crappie fishing, which is the Cabela’s Crappie USA Classic held in September each year. Of course, there are qualifying events held in many other states, too.

Actually, the ACA conducts 45 events annually in over 20 states! The tournaments are divided up into four regions. Each region conducts a minimum of two qualifying events in the fall, and six qualifying tournaments in the spring. Last year, the ACA conducted two events in the spring on Indiana waters. Last April, a tournament was conducted on Patoka Lake, and other tournaments were conducted on Salamonie, Mississinewa and Huntington reservoirs.

The ACA states that their purpose is to establish and expand a family-oriented, cost-effective and competitive arena for amateur and semi-pro crappie anglers as the foundation to promote and market products and services. It is interesting to note that the ACA held a total of four tournaments in Hoosierland during 2006.

One of the most accomplished outdoorsmen I know once said there is a very simple rule for having (harvest) success when hunting and fishing. And that rule is: Fish where there’s fish (i.e., the species you are fishing for) and hunt where there’s game. If we apply that rule to crappie fishing, we can use the ACA’s choices of lakes for its tournaments as a springboard to get us "on" crappies.

There is little doubt about it . . . the ACA is simply not going to select lakes for a crappie tournament that have poor crappie population levels. To prove this out, you can look at the tournament results on the ACA’s Web site (www.crappieusa.com). You’ll be pleased to see what the tournament champions and big-fish winners hauled in.

Using the ACA’s picks, and Indiana’s Department of Fish and Wildlife biologists’ input as our primary criteria, let’s now take a look at crappie hotspots in the north, central and southern parts of Indiana.