Just wondering if anyone has had the experience of pulling a lunker crappie through a six inch hole. Lost a nice one last winter and wonder if it would have fit up the hole. thanks

i found a deal at strikmaster on a newer lazer style 7" auger, that fit my old auger. well it has worked really good, and i mostly fish panfish. I have landed nice crappies on red, and other lakes where they get large. did you have a locator down the hole? Sometimes that can get in the way.

try drilling 2 holes almost on top of eachtother, so you get a longer hole that is roughly 12" x 6" That seems to be a good work around and gives you extra room. I have been doing that the past few years and it works great. Plus one side can be used for the marcum and under water camera.

I've used a hand held lazer that makes a 6 inch hole...very quick drilling too! Crappies, a long with a walleye, came up nicely through it. Like Swill said, I was using a locator and it did get in the way; I had to pull that out and then reel up my line.

Maybe like he said, drill 2 right next to each other to either have a "big" hole or one for the locator and one for your line.

buy a bigger auger simple way to solve that problem

last spring i lost 2 crappies that were bigger than any i have ever seen because i had a 10 inch hole. they came off and down they went. one was at the top of the hole and turned sideways and literally filled the complete hole. i was in shock. easy 17 inchers. the holes were nice for sight fishing tho.

A lot of people prefer the smaller holes for that very reason, the fish cant turn as easily and go back down the hole. I would think that any crappie would fit through a 6" hole, so to answer your question, I would think yes the fish would have fit. It would take a crappie that is 6" tall to not fit, I guess I have never measured the height of the slabs I have caught, but I dont think they were taller than 6". Also heard of many big pike, bass, and eye's fitting through a 6" hole, but personally I use 7".

one of my buddies has extremely good luck and has actually lost crappies that would not fit in a 6 inch hole. he has one mounted that he had to grab and squeeze it up the hole and the fins were damaged from it and it had a scar on its back too. i think 7 or 8 inch is the best.

mrkleans got it right.lol I dont use anything less than an eight inch.I love havin the big clear ten inch hole too.

Exactly! There is no reason to go bigger than an 8" hole. I've pulled walleyes up to 11 pounds and pike up to 20lbs through an 8" hole no problem. And like chad said, fish can turn and go back down the hole.

I would think you are fine only fish ive ever seen get stuck is a walleye in a 4in hole! That was funny stuff...but if you mainly fish panfish 6in is more than enough and personally I think 10in is kinda excessive for most fishing. The 12in is coming soon!!

I prefer the 8" also. 10 just seems too big for me. lose fish, vex can fit in 10 and not to mention in case you accidentally step in it when tearing down. saw it once. it was pretty funny from my vantage point, but it was my buddys GF and I also got a slap from the whole ordeal.

The smaller that will still do the job, the better. The bigger the auger the more slush you have to deal with and when there is 30 inches of ice that is a lot of ice shavings especially with a 10 inch auger. Weight is the other issue. You can run an 8 inch with the smaller motor just fine. You really need a 3 hp for a 10 inch hole.

Also, I seem to be able to get tangled up with my ducer no matter what size hole I am fishing out of. I just love the look on the walleyes face when it comes loose at the transducer. It's like he can't believe it either.

I was booby trapped by a 10" hole last year while running. Messed my foot and ankle up pretty good. A 12" comes out and I'm wearing snow shoes.

omg! roflmao!!!!

It's not that a fish gets stuck in the hole but a lot of times it is because you lose the proper line tension when a fish runs into the hole wall and then the hook becomes unbuckled. I did one time had my hook point snag the edge of the ice and the crappie swam away. Another time it was the line that caught in the corner of the ice hole and the walleye eventually got a way.