To his 12-foot-long B 'n' M crappie rod, Coleman attaches an old Ambassadeur 25 reel loaded with 6- to 12-pound-test line -- Berkley Trilene XL, extra-abrasive -- that's rigged with homemade leaders 2 pounds lighter than the main line. "That way, if I snag up I can break off, hook on another pre-built leader and get back to fishing right away," he explained."

Coleman usually tips his jigs with 2 1/2- to 3-inch minnows. "I think guys often use too small of minnows," he said. "One time I cut open a bunch of 1 1/2 pound crappies to see what they were eating. Every one had balls of rolled up shad stuffed into their stomachs. When I unrolled the shad, they were up to 5 inches long. That taught me that crappies aren't intimidated by big minnows. I think I've been averaging bigger crappies since I started using bigger minnows."

Bert Bennett has a secret weapon when he uses long poles to doodlesock crappies: his 13-year-old-son. "Brandon's been fishing crappie tournaments with me since he was seven, and he seems to have a knack for doing the right thing to catch crappies, even if it seems wrong at the time," Bennett said, laughing.

Many crappie anglers disdain fish attractants or flavored bait; the elder Bennett used to be one of them. At one tournament, young Brandon, 7 years old at the time, got bored and began toying with some fish scent that had been distributed to all the entrants. As might be expected, he managed to spill the attractant on the boat's carpet. On a whim, he rubbed his jig on the fish-flavored carpet. "He long-poled that jig down into a brushpile and caught the fifth-biggest crappie of that tournament," his dad recalled with a chuckle. "When he began outfishing me by rubbing his jigs on that smelly chunk of carpet, we dug around to find the scent and used it for the rest of the day."

Since then, the Bennetts have reached the conclusion that flavored baits are never a disadvantage and often an advantage. Young Brandon is particularly fond of Berkley Crappie Nibbles and uses them most of the time, while his father experiments with bare tube jigs and jigs tipped with minnows.

"Some days they don't make a difference," said the elder Bennett. "Some days he whips me bad."

The Bennetts generally use 10-foot long poles for doodlesocking, but they pull out the 12-footers to avoid spooking crappies in shallow water if the water is clear. Their jigs are usually 1/16 ounce, but they'll go up to as much as 3/8 ounce if they're probing brushpiles in up to 30 feet of water post-spawn.

During the spawn, when crappies are in shallow bays and coves, the Bennetts look for changes in shoreline structure. Transitions are the key: If the shoreline is flooded weeds, with a pocket of willows, they'll fish the edge between willows and weeds.

"We were fishing a tournament where there was one bay that was solid flooded willows," recalled Bennett senior. "We found a spot where one of the willows had blown over. We fished that one blown-over willow and took out enough 1- and 2-pound crappies to get us 13th out of 148 boats."

The Bennetts use large jig hooks to avoid tearing out the papermouths' mouths as the fish are hoisted vertically from brushy cover when doodlesocking. "We rarely use smaller than a No. 2 hook," he said. "If you use a big hook you'll tend to hook them behind that papermouth and lose fewer fish."

Their final tips for novice doodlesockers: Move deliberately; fish precisely. "Every lake we go to, there are always some older local gentlemen in straw hats and bibbed overalls with a cooler full of slabs," Bert Bennett offered in conclusion. "They may move slow because they're old, but that slow speed is probably what helps them catch so many crappies.

"That's the key to doodlesocking. Move slow, fish every inch of structure, and you'll catch more crappies doodlesocking than you could ever hope to catch if you were casting a jig in that heavy cover."