More crappie are caught annually on tube baits than on any other presentation with the exception of live minnows. Still, a surprising number of crappie fans either haven’t fished tubes extensively or view the tube as a one-trick pony that only works when jigged vertically in brushpiles.
Veteran Tennessee guide Jim Duckworth has perfected many deadly tube-bait rigging methods and presentations, many of which he shares with clients to expand their menu of tube-fishing options. If you’re hankering to catch more and bigger crappie on your home lake, give Duckworth’s patented tube tricks a try.

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While most crappie anglers use tube baits only when fishing submerged brushpiles, Duckworth manages to vertical fish a tube in brush without staying constantly hung up.
“You need to use the right equipment,” he says. “Most anglers probably use a light spinning rod or a whippy pole exclusively for crappie, but for vertical tube fishing, I use a 6½-foot medium-action baitcasting rod with a baitcasting reel spooled with 20-pound moss green braided line. This may seem like I’m bringing an elephant gun to a dove shoot, but consider that braided line will not stretch and has a low diameter. In fact, 20-pound braid is about as thin as 8-pound mono. It’s strong enough so if you hang up your tube, which is bound to happen sooner or later, you can just reel down hard on the lure and its hook will straighten, allowing you to retrieve the bait.”
Duckworth also uses a Tru-Tungsten drop-shot sinker on the bottom, either a 3⁄8- or ¾-ounce model depending on how deep he’s fishing.
“Tungsten sinkers are more compact than lead and slip in and out of brush more easily,” Duckworth says. “Sure, they cost more, but with this heavy line and tackle, you’ll seldom lose a sinker.”
When vertical fishing, Duckworth uses Blakemore Turbo Tail tubes in a variety of colors. The difference between this setup and the Kentucky rig so popular with Southern crappie anglers is that with a Kentucky rig, one or two tube baits (each rigged on a jighead) are tied above a heavy sinker. With Duckworth’s drop-shot rig, he doesn’t rig the tube on a jighead but on a red No. 2 Tru-Turn Standout drop-shot hook.
“The unique design of this hook allows the tube to literally stand out from the line at a 90-degree angle, so it’s both visible to the fish and unlikely to tangle in the main line,” Duckworth says. “I tie the hook anywhere from 1 to 5 feet above the sinker depending on how high the brush is piled off the bottom. If the brushpile is 3 feet high, I rig the tube about 3½ feet above the sinker. The idea is to present the tube just over the heads of the fish.”
When fishing this rig, Duckworth will check his graph to determine the depth of the cover and the depth at which crappie may be suspending around it, then position his boat directly over the target and lower the sinker straight down into the brush.
“Rather than jigging the sinker/tube up and down or shaking it, I’ll just hold the rod steady and let wave action or the subtle natural vibrations of my hand activate the tube,” he explains. “After leaving it in one spot for 30 seconds to a minute, I’ll pick up the sinker and drop it back down a foot or so from where I last fished it. I’ll keep doing this until I’ve worked my way all around the brushy cover or fish attractor.”
Of course, tubes aren’t just for vertical jigging. When casting tubes, you can use a lightweight jighead so your tube drifts down slowly and naturally like a dying minnow, or you can employ a heavier jighead so you can cast it easily and feel the lure through your rod.
“You need to strike a balance between castability, feel and a natural-looking rate of fall,” Duckworth says. “When casting a tube vs. fishing it vertically, I switch to spinning gear, using my 8-foot B’n’M Jim Duckworth Float ’n Fly Crappie Special rod. This sweet two-piece rod can cast a 1⁄16-ounce tube jig 35 to 40 yards. I pair this rod with a Cardinal 702 reel spooled with 20-pound braid.”
Duckworth uses braid not so much for its strength and lack of stretch, but because it floats and slows down the rate at which the tube jig drops so his presentation looks more natural.
“If I’m casting into the wind, I’ll pinch a small split shot on my line about a foot up from the tube,” he says. “Then once the tube hits the water, I’ll count it down to the depth where I see crappie holding on my graph, then reel it in with a slow, steady retrieve.”
Duckworth’s method of counting down a tube jig comes from his many diving experiences and watching how different lures fall from the fish’s point of view.
“A crappie tube on a 1⁄16-ounce jighead and 20-pound braid will sink about 6 inches per second,” he says. “A 1⁄8-ounce tube will sink slightly faster, but not twice as fast. Counting down isn’t precise, but it helps give you a feel for where your lure is in the water column. This matters because crappie often suspend rather than hold tight to bottom.”

At times, Duckworth uses jigheads heavier than 1⁄8 ounce on his crappie tubes, such as when crappie are very deep.
“I always keep a stash of 1⁄16- to ¼-ounce jigheads in my boat,” he says. “With this weight range, you can cover most crappie situations. On a recent guide trip, the fish were holding on the deep edges of main-lake flats in 16 feet of water, and we caught all our crappie on 1⁄4-ounce heads.”
Duckworth remains a huge fan of jig spinners for crappie, and often finds himself using them just about any time he’s making a horizontal vs. vertical tube presentation.
“Most crappie anglers use jig spinners only in murky water, and it’s true that the vibration put out by the little spinner blade helps crappie home in on the lure more easily when visibility is low,” he says. “But in slightly stained to gin-clear water, the blade also catches light and gives the lure the lifelike flash of a live minnow.”
Jig spinners come with both Colorado (rounded) and willow-leaf (elongated) blade styles. The Colorado blade puts out more thump and is Duckworth’s top choice in muddy to murky water. The willow blade, which produces less vibration, has the natural look and flash of a live minnow, and thus is a more realistic presentation in clearer water.
Stacking multiple tube baits on your line is a great way to cover the water column more thoroughly when crappie are scattered while giving your presentation the enticing look of a school of minnows.
“I’ll often tie ¼-, 1⁄8- and 1⁄16-ounce tube jigs on my line, stacking them a foot apart with the heaviest on the bottom and the lightest on top,” Duckworth says. “I especially like to use a jig spinner instead of a regular tube jig on the bottom and two tube jigs above it. Always mix up tube and jighead colors when using multiple presentations. You’ll usually find that on a given day, the fish will prefer one color over the others 2-to-1.”
This type of “stacker” rig is best in early spring, late fall or early winter, when the water temperature ranges from around 48 to 58 degrees.
“I like to fish it on steep ledges and channel banks with a 45-degree slope into deep water,” he says. “Just cast the rig to the bank, let the heaviest jig hit bottom, then swim it back to the boat with a slow, steady retrieve.”
The idea is to just tick the bottom with the heaviest jig while the two lighter jigs are swimming above and slightly behind it. If the heaviest bait is hanging up frequently, Duckworth will clip the hook off it and just use it as a bottom-bumping sinker, similar to drop-shotting.
“Always keep a light drag when fishing a stacker rig for crappie,” he says. “I’ve caught 6-pound smallmouth bass on it.”
As a multi-species guide who fishes for everything from bluegill to stripers, Duckworth has found that crappie are far and away the most color-sensitive of all the species he targets.
“They can drive you crazy because they’ll be hot on a specific color one minute, then totally turn off that color the next,” he says. “Therefore, I try to show them as many different color combinations as possible, even when fishing just one tube jig at a time.”
For example, Duckworth may rig a white and blue tube on a red jighead. This presentation would offer three colors in one lure. Using a jig spinner adds another color option into the mix since the spinner blades come in either gold or silver.
“They make tubes in 10,000 different color combinations, but my all-time favorites are blue/white, chartreuse/white and red/white,” Duckworth says. “These will catch crappie in just about any lake in the country.”
Fishing a tube bait under a bobber is another deadly method in spring when crappie are shallow. It also is an easy and exciting way to introduce kids to crappie fishing.
“Use a 1⁄16- or 1⁄8-ounce tube jig and set the bobber far enough up your line so the lure hangs just above submerged cover,” Duckworth says. “Cast, let the jig settle and then shake the rod tip gently to activate the tube. This is also a killer presentation when crappie are holding in submerged weedbeds.”
Duckworth also likes to troll crankbaits on the edges of main-lake flats for post-spawn crappie. He’s had good luck attaching a tube bait rigged on a panfish hook to a wire leader and running this off the end of the crankbait.
“The plug will bump bottom and alert the fish, then they see the tube swimming behind it and grab it,” he explains. “I’ve often caught two crappie at the same time on this setup.”
Another effective tube-bait trick is to make a weedguard for your tube jig by Super-Gluing a small piece of stiff 50-pound monofilament catfish line to the top of the jighead.
“Perhaps the easiest thing you can do to increase your tube-bait catch is to add scent to plain, unscented tubes,” Duckworth says. “Beyond that, tubes are the most versatile of all artificial crappie lures, and there are endless ways to rig and fish them.”

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