Choosing the right weight and style of sinker to get your minnow or artificial lure where the fish live is one of the fundamental challenges of crappie angling.

The variables involved in sinker selection are seemingly endless. You need to factor in the depth of the fish, the amount and type of cover, wind velocity, boat speed and more. Too much weight can spook the fish or put your presentation too deep. Too little weight may keep your presentation too high in the water column and make it too hard to cast your offering into the wind.

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To further compound the confusion, the use of lead sinkers has been banned in a growing number of states for environmental reasons, and alternative (and pricier) sinker materials including brass, bismuth, tin and tungsten are being heavily promoted. All of this makes the topic of sinker selection a murky one.
To help clear the air on the weighty subject of sinkers and to disclose the hottest trends in fishing weights, expert guides and veteran fishermen offer their advice for making your live-bait and lure presentations more appealing and precise.

Heavy Metal
Newcomers to crappie fishing are often shocked to see the heavy metal many expert anglers use to keep their lures or live baits in the strike zone.
“Spider-rigging is unquestionably the hottest presentation tactic in crappie fishing, and heavy sinkers play a huge role in this multi-pole approach,” says guide Brad Whitehead.
One of the most proficient “spidermen” in the country, Whitehead employs a mixture of lead sinkers and tungsten weights on his poles.
“Spider-rigging is a vertical approach, meaning it puts your lures straight down under the boat,” he says. “This method demands a heavy sinker in order to position your lure close to isolated pieces of cover and suspended crappie.”
In winter, spring and fall, most of Whitehead’s poles are rigged with 1- and 2-ounce Xcalibur Tg sinkers.
“The Tg weight is a barrel-shaped tungsten sinker with a hole running completely through it, similar in style to the sinkers bass anglers favor for their Carolina plastic-worm rigs,” he notes. “It has a sleeve running through it that protects your line.”
Whitehead claims tungsten sinkers are superior to lead because they are harder, environmentally friendly and more compact.
“They’re considerably smaller than lead sinkers of equivalent weight,” he says. “Tungsten sinkers cost more than lead sinkers, but as long as you’re not fishing places where break-offs are frequent, I feel the added expense is worth it because their smaller size allows a stealthier presentation. This is especially beneficial in clear water, where crappie are likely to be extremely spooky.”
Whitehead uses both lightweight tube jigs and crankbaits on his spider rigs, depending on the season and crappie location/mood.
“I tie two 3-inch Yum twist-tail walleye grubs, each rigged on 1⁄16-ounce jigheads, on my main line and place the sinker 16 to 20 inches above the highest jig,” he explains. “As I move along a ledge, channel drop or depth contour under trolling-motor power, the jigs swing freely below the sinker, which gives them a highly realistic action. Two strikes per pole are common with this setup when you pass through a school of fish.”

In summer, Whitehead switches to heavier lead sinkers — up to 5 ounces on each pole — to compensate for the faster crankbait-trolling approach he employs in warmer water. He claims these extra-heavy sinkers are also a big help when slow-trolling jigs on windy days, when tiny twisters on lines with lighter weights may fail to get down to the level of the fish.

Competitive Edge
Missouri angler Larry McMullin is one of the biggest money-winners on the professional crappie tournament trail. He has invested considerable time perfecting his spider-rigging approach and knows that heavy sinkers give him a competitive edge.
“I use big catfish sinkers on my spider rigs, the pear-shaped variety with a swivel built into the narrow end,” McMullin explains. “I use whatever weight it takes to keep my presentation dead-vertical under the conditions I’m fishing. I’ve been known to use 12 ounces of weight per pole on a windy day.”
Using sinkers this heavy demands special tackle.
“A regular crappie pole has a tip section that’s far too light to handle that much weight,” McMullin says. “I take extendable 17-foot crappie poles and whack a foot off the tip section to make them stiffer. These are then rigged with cheap baitcasting reels spooled with 12-pound gold Stren line, a high-visibility product that makes detecting light bites easy.”
When trolling small jigs on his spider rigs, McMullin ties several lures on his main line via a series of short leader lines.
“I’ll turn on the trolling motor, lower the rigs straight down and place the poles in rod holders,” he says. “As I move along, the jigs feather out behind the main line on their leaders and give the appearance of a school of minnows. The heavy weight keeps the main line straight down and helps eliminate tangles.”
During post-spawn, McMullin lightens his approach.
“After crappie leave their shallow spawning areas in the backs of coves and start gravitating toward the main lake, they often go into a suspending mode and can be hard to catch,” he says. “Plus, the lake is starting to clear up now that the rainy season is over, making the bite even tougher. Catching post-spawn fish in clear water usually requires that you downsize your presentation.”
McMullin removes the super-heavy sinkers from his spider rigs and replaces them with less obtrusive ¼-ounce to 5⁄8-ounce weights.
“During post-spawn, crappie are extremely finicky, so I’ll slow-troll a combination of tube jigs and live minnows, watching my graph for scattered schools of fish,” he says. “You’ll often find them suspending around a migration route leading from shallow to deeper water, such as a submerged ditch or shallow creek channel.”

Tungsten Tips
Tennessee guide Jim Duckworth is constantly experimenting with new crappie-catching systems, and he’s a solid proponent of tungsten sinkers.
“Tungsten is the ticket on today’s heavily pressured lakes,” he claims. “Besides their compact size, tungsten holds paint much better than lead. This allows you to use a painted sinker that either blends into its surroundings for a more camouflaged presentation, which is highly desirable in clear water, or one that’s brightly colored when you need more attraction in murky or muddy water. Tungsten weights are so much harder than lead that they transmit subtle changes in bottom composition and contour right up through your line and rod tip.”
The precision and consistency of tungsten sinkers are an added plus for Duckworth.
“Lead sinkers vary a great deal as to weight, but if it says ½ ounce on a tungsten sinker’s packaging, you can trust that it’ll weigh exactly ½ ounce,” he says. “This is a major benefit when you’re trying to dial in the right amount of weight to fine-tune your presentation.”
Duckworth often employs tungsten sinkers when
bobber fishing.
“Using a small sinker below the bobber gets your minnow or tube down quicker and keeps it where you want it,” he explains. “When bobber fishing, I use tiny 1⁄16- and 1⁄8-ounce Tru-Tungsten bullet worm weights, depending on how deep the fish are suspending. I also use their Peter T pegging system, which allows you to peg the sinker so you can position it anywhere along the line you desire without the line abrasion you get from pegging with a toothpick.”
To keep break-offs to a minimum, Duckworth recommends braided line when fishing with costlier tungsten sinkers.
“I use 20-pound Spider Wire with tungsten weights,” he says. “This super-strong line minimizes break-offs, yet its slim diameter helps you maintain a low profile in clear water.”

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