Bite forecast
Today's Bite Forecast
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Overall rating
Black Crappie at Lake Champlain — 2026-10-05
Poor · 37/100Best window: 8 PM (Poor · 37/100)
- Season
- Fall
- Moon
- 23% illuminated, waningWaning Crescent
- Est. surface temp
- 56.8°F
- Pressure
- 29.98 inHgRising
Est. water temp
56.8°F
v1 estimate from air temperature — not a sensor reading
Below Black Crappie's 72-77°F range
Air vs. last week
4°F cooler
51°F now vs 55°F this time last week
Measured air temperature at the nearest weather station — not water
Sun & moon
- Sunrise
- 6:56 AM
- Sunset
- 6:26 PM
- Moonrise
- 12:52 AM
- Moonset
- 4:12 PM
Sky, wind & pressureat best window · 8 PM
- Cloud cover
- 45%
- Precip chance
- 2%
- Wind
- 20 mph NW
- Pressure
- 29.98 inHg Rising
Species context
Why this score
Poor (37/100) for Black Crappie: water is estimated at 56.8°F, below Black Crappie's 72-77°F optimal range. Best window: Night — boosts feeding activity by about 20%. That hour also overlaps a major solunar period. 29.98 inHg and rising pressure modeled about 6% above this fish's baseline. Strong (20+ mph) wind modeled about 10% below this fish's baseline.
What's driving the 8 PM score
Light window (night) is doing the most for this score. The score gives up the most on water temperature — 56.8°F estimated, about 45 points below its best. The whole day is then scaled to 75% for post-cold-front high.
- Water temperature · hurting
- Light window · helping
- Solunar period · helping
- Barometric pressure · helping
- Wind · helping
Show the numbers behind this
Water temperature: 56.8°F estimated
0 of 45 pts
Optimal range 72-77°F
Well supportedWater temperature governs a cold-blooded fish's metabolism, so it is the largest term in the model (Christie & Regier 1988). The figure is a thermal-lag estimate built from forecast air temperature and the time of year — not a sensor reading, and not this lake's actual measured water.
Light window: Night
27.7 of 30 pts
Boosts feeding activity by about 20%
Well supportedLow-light feeding windows are the strongest timing signal inside a single day. How much each window is worth is this species' own cited response, sourced in its model file, not a generic curve.
Solunar period: Major period
5 of 5 pts
Not supported by testingPeer-reviewed testing of North American freshwater fisheries found no significant relationship between solunar values, lunar phase or lunar illumination and catch rates (SN Applied Sciences, 2023) — air temperature predicted catch better than any solunar table tested. It is shown because anglers expect it, and it is shown separately so you can discount it. The owner reviewed this evidence and demoted its weight accordingly.
Barometric pressure: Stable (held neutral by the front)
9.4 of 10 pts
Modeled flat — no change from this fish's baseline
ContestedThe barometric effect is real to most anglers but small and contested in the literature — several of the species studies cited in this model report null results — so it carries one of the smallest weights here.
Wind: Strong (20+ mph)
7.5 of 10 pts
Modeled about 10% below this fish's baseline
Moderately supportedWind stacks forage on windward structure, but both the size and the direction of the effect depend on the species and the water, so it carries a modest weight.
Then the whole score is scaled
Season: Fall — ×1.00 (100% of the ungated score)
How catchable Black Crappie are at this point in the year. This scales the whole score rather than competing with the factors above — a fish that is dormant this time of year cannot score well no matter how good the hour looks.
Weather front: Post-cold-front high — ×0.75 (75% of the ungated score)
A multi-hour frontal pattern read from the day's forecast trajectory. Because a front IS a barometric event, it replaces the single-reading pressure factor above, which is held neutral — the barometer is never counted twice.
Those five factors add up to 49.6 of 100 points, and the two multipliers above take that to 37. The weights are tuning constants — solunar's was demoted after peer-reviewed testing found no predictive effect (#456), and the rest remain under owner review — shown here rather than hidden so you can weigh them against your own judgement.
What this score does not know
- Water clarity. We have no source for it and do not estimate it.
- Measured water temperature. The figure in the breakdown is a model over forecast air temperature, not a reading from a buoy or a probe.
- Baitfish and forage activity.
- How much fishing pressure this water has had.
- Where the fish actually are. Depth bands are the species' published seasonal ranges, not an observation of this lake.
- What anyone actually caught. No catch reports feed this score.
Conditions read from the National Weather Service as of Oct 5, 2026 at 8:45 PM EDT. Solunar periods and sun/moon times are computed, not fetched.
When best caught
It's currently fall. Black Crappie typically hold 0-10 ft deep this time of year — at an estimated 56.8°F, this looks like a slower time of year to target them, since water temp is outside their optimal range.
Current depth
0-10 ft
This is the seasonal depth band from the species model — relative to this species' typical behavior, not this lake's actual structure. True depth relative to this lake's bottom contours needs lake bathymetry (tracked in issue #175).
Today's solunar periods
- Minor: 12:22 AM–1:22 AM
- Major: 7:40 AM–9:40 AM
- Minor: 3:42 PM–4:42 PM
- Major: 8:06 PM–10:06 PM
Best times
When do black crappie feed during the day?
Black Crappie feed most actively at Dawn and Dusk, when activity runs about 16% above the daily average across all four light windows.
- Dawn1.30x
Boosts feeding activity by about 30%.
- Daytime0.70x
Suppresses feeding activity by about 30%.
- Dusk1.30x
Boosts feeding activity by about 30%.
- Night1.20x
Boosts feeding activity by about 20%.
Hour by hour
Hourly bite forecast
| Hour | Bite score | Rating | Light | Wind |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 PM | 37 | Poor | Night | 20 mph NW |
| 9 PM | 37 | Poor | Night | 22 mph NW |
| 10 PM | 37 | Poor | Night | 24 mph NW |
| 11 PM | 35 | Poor | Night | 24 mph NW |
Location
Lake Champlain · 44.5912, -73.3063
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