Originally posted by Bruce Condello:
Crappie are notoriously difficult to feed train. It can be done, and Cecil Baird knows a heck of a lot more than I, but it requires a lot of time and effort to feed train them, and even then many never catch on to the idea.
Actually there may be exceptions to that Bruce. I had one trout grower tell me they seine crappies out of ponds and put them in raceways for the winter and they feed on the trout chow just like the trout. Unfortunately this grower is the one that hauled them with the 2 to 3 pound trout and they took a beating with many succumbing to fungus.
My supplier this spring has feed trained crappies and he is the one that will have the feed trained redears. He's only a couple of hours away at the most and I will probably put them in oxygen bags to get them home. I'll even cover the bags to keep light out which may help.
Could it be that most growers don't bother feed training crappies because it's less labor intensive to not feed them or feed train them, and they just let them grow out on zooplankton in ponds?
