deet wrote:Felon, what's your opinion on comparable crappie size to a 10" sunfish?
I used to feel like 10" sunnies were about like 14" crappies, but lately I've found places to catch literally dozen's of 10+ inch sunnies in a trip, whereas I've never caught multiple 14" crappies at a time (other than Red Lake 20 years ago).
Really a 10" sunny is now about as rare as a 12" crappie. So I get your gripe with peoples' obsession with big sunnies - they're actually very common. I can't seem to find big crappies like I can find big sunnies.
BUT I can think of many many lakes where I'm pretty sure I could NOT catch 10" sunfish even if I tried for a few days.
Before I even read the rest of your post 12" is what instantly popped into my head.
The lake the cabin is on that I've fished my whole life on and caught thousands of crappies out of is a good crappie lake....an outstanding one really in many ways. Crappies seem to grow pretty fast and despite adequate to high fishing pressure crappies above 10" are abundant, and of the fat/thick variety. Any crappie that hits 10" maybe 10.5" has "shoulders" to it.
Until a 12.5" I caught this spring 12.25" was the biggest all of us combined had ever caught. 12"s are fairly common....it's not that hard for a couple guys to catch their limits with half over 11" and a few 'footer' slabs mixed in....but they're right at 12." We've maybe caught a dozen to two dozen 12.25" over the decades and until this spring I'd long declared 12.25" is where they maxed out at. Just like we're not ever going to see a 45" pike pulled out, we're not going to see a 14" crappie. Both are possible....neither are going to happen.
Red was an anomaly....in terms of numbers. I think all our big lakes from Pepin to LOTW are capable of producing big crappies, maybe not in numbers but the bigger the water the bigger the fish.
Even lakes in the West metro are more capable of bigger crappies than the East metro. Ottertail and that part of the state produces bigger panfish and fish probably grow faster overall than the rest of the state. A walleye fry in a fertile wetland grows almost twice as fast as a walleye fry in the boundary waters....just ask the DNR....this sort of stuff has, and never should, be rocket science.
My vote is on leaving things as is and trying to change the culture of anglers. Changing limits and creating different zones for different types of lakes that produce bigger or smaller panfish isn't that effective.
Look at the pike regs. At first I thought they were great until I realized their inherent problem....
....anglers didn't want to keep a limit of little pike when the limit was three, and they sure as shit don't want to keep a limit of little pike with the limit being ten.
Until you change angler's attitudes and fishing culture new regs aren't worth a hill of beans.