The Lily Pad" Crappie Strategy To catch crappie around lily pads, you'll want to start by easing up to the lily pads and try something like a 12 foot pole with 8-pound test. Couple it with a ¼-ounce jig head, and you've got your rig. Now, the crappie are lying in wait, just under the lily pads because they are expecting a visit from minnows they intend to ambush. What you have to do is swim your jig right under the pad - using the ¼-ounce jig will help carry you down in the hole between the lily pads with such a long pole (which is used to give you the power and leverage to yank that crappie right out of the water as soon as it bites). Remember that a hole may have more than one crappie, and the faster you can yank one out of the water without a real disturbance, the better. You want to grab more from the same hole. If there's no struggle on the crappie's part, his friends will think he's been abducted by aliens rather than caught for the next fish fry and won't be so spooked and likely to turn tail and run (pun intended). You can find a ton of brilliant strategies for catching crappie in almost any situation you can imagine here: