Are they fairly common? I've caught both black and white, but sometimes I get into a batch that are probably hybrids. Just curious....They all taste good to me .

I don't think they are that common....yet.
I stocked some hybrid crappies last year.
I've found most fish suppliers dont regularly offer them.
Others may know better than I do.

When both are present in a body of water I believe there are. I see them as a taxidermist from time to time. A local biologist says he does too. They will have the physical appearance of one but have the spine count of the other species.

Interestingly the biggest ones I get in are usually hybrids. I'm talking 3 lb. 18 inch fish.

now we talkin cecil!

Where can I find these hybrid crappie?

Contact teehjaeh57 here at PondBoss and he will be very willing and helpful. I think his came from south of you.

Cecil, that just amazes me!! What are the spine counts of black vs white vs hybrid?

Do they reproduce?

They will reproduce faster then W.Va. people in a blackout.

Yes, but the theory is their offspring are inferior and don't cause an overpopulation/competition issue. This has not been proven though.

Extensive discussion on the "Magnolia Crappie" here.

No set spine count on a hybrid. At least not the ones I've seen. As you probably know black crappies tend to have 7 to 9 dorsal fins spines and a white crappies only 6. The most common hybrid I've seen is they have a vertical bar pattern like a white crappie but have 7 to 9 spines like a black crappie.

In the wild, the natural hybrids are not common, but certainly do occur. They often show up in a water body that has a lot of one crappie species, and few of the other species. I saw a strong year class of them in a public lake I worked on in Kansas a long time ago. It had black crappies, and we rarely saw a white crappie. Suddenly, here was this abundant group of hybrids one year. Anglers sure didn't care!

Check the Crappie archive . It has info on hybrids.

http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=92447#Post92447

Good Photo of white, hybrid and black next to each other

FWIW, I will be where the hybrid BC are created next Monday on my way to PA if anyone wants some picked up....just PM me on forecast air temps and availability. Crappie are VERY hard to handle outside of ideal conditions.

Just got done cleaning a couple dozen crappie (b&w) a friend gave me because he was to tired and to late to clean them. Fillets are in the freezer now but you could definatly tell the difference between the black vs white. Also it seems like there is more meat on the BCP.

Didn't notice any hybrids but a couple of the WCP were dang near void of any side markings.

From CJ's link - photo courtesy of Jim Negus or John Hammonds .

Douglas Reservoir Tennessee white, hybrid, and black crappie

Speaking of Crappies a friend in PA is trying to get me to buy some of his feed trained crappies. I wish I had a pond for them. He also has feed trained walleye.

Wow. I thought that was damn near impossible. Is he a member here so he could share how he did this?

Forum websites aren't his cup of tea.

Here's his website:

http://buybass.com/

I hope this is O.K. with the mods?

You don't own this business do you?

I don't see anything feed-trained on the website so I assume it's an under the table thing for friends. Would be cool to hear how he trained the walleyes.

No I don't own it. Kevin has a method of feed training fish that is proprietary.

I had what appeared to be some second generation feed training going Monday Afternoon. I was feeding minnows some ground floating feed and the wind moved them farther from the bank. I noticed what looked to be a small school of BCP darting into the minnows causing them jump out of the water. Easy living for those fat and juicy minnows is over with now.

Are those BCP Cecil? I might have to get some of those feed trained WE's. (as soon as I remove the 7lb+ CC's).

Hybrid crappie for pond stocking has really got me interested.

Yes they are black crappies.

What's Kevin up to these days?

34 ponds. Keeping busy.

And you're putting it mildly!

They aren't recreational ponds. Most are production ponds I assume which are needed if you are in the business of supplying fish for stocking.

He's got one of the better hatcheries for warmwater game fish in PA in my opinion. Only problem for me is he is on the wrong side of the state...

Hybridization between white and black crappie very common in Weiss Lake, AL, many moons ago when I was working on that project in grad school. Can search AFS archives for findings- Smith, Dunham, Maceina. Spine counts don't work.

i feel like i am having some success feed training 4 black crappie in a 60 gallon aquarium. I wanted to get some small ones but i was only able to get the last 6 emaciated 3-6" crappie from a local supplier.

I have only had them for 1 week and I already have one eating freeze dried krill from the surface. It was a challenge to get them to try the krill. I did it by manually agitating the water around the krill (after they get settled into the new surroundings the crappie are not shy fish) but once he tasted it that one continued to search the surface and seems to eat any dried krill i put in there. I just keep working on queues to increase their feed aggression, like opening the top of the aquarium and turning on the light in the room. After i get the other crappie on board with eating the non-moving krill at the surface i will try to get them to taste some softened up high protein feed.

I think this would be easy if i started with fry or fingerlings.

brian

That is the way to do it. Teaching a hand full of fish isn't too hard. It's teaching large numbers without large losses is the trick.