How do you fish a new pond at night?

[stanollie]

I'm planning on trying an overnight crappie fishing trip with some friends. There are two possible bodies of water we might try. I have never fished either of them. Both have inlets and outlets. I do have depth maps but have no idea of any bottom structure. One is about 100 acres and the other is about 500. Both have a max depth of about 20 feet.

So my question is how would one fish either of these at night since we will be setting up a shelter and probably doing most fishing from inside the shelter. We might setup a few traps outside the shelter as well.

Would you try the larger or smaller pond? Would you setup closer to the inlet than the outlet? Should we just try to get as close to the max depth or is there a certain depth to look for? Any suggestions for bait or jigging lures would also be helpful.

Thanks in advance.

[rboot]

hopefully you know there are crappie in both of these ponds.  Crappie should be in the deep water now if they have that option in a small pond.  Don't know what the weed situation is like,  I would start in the deep hole near shallow structure.  Basin areas, you should be able to get on them if you have a depth map.  Then get yourself a good bright light for your shanty, a red glow fat boy tipped with a small minnow, electronics are helpful when fishing at night, good luck to you.

[slipperybob]

Depends a lot on your pond.  I just fished a 500 acre lake and the fish were not in the deep hole of 18 feet.  Most of the fish were actually in the mid column of 10-12 feet.  The lake was extremely murky and stained.  A lot of decomposition in the water, so oxygen content must be a lot lower in the deeper water.