My crappies used to pick on my longears until the le got bigger. Then the dominate male le tried picking on the crappie. They just sit there are look at them like "whatcha gonna do, I aint runnin". I still have had no luck getting my 2 black crappies to eat pellets after 6 or 7 months. They want live worms or minnows. I have starved them over a month and they still spit them out. I can put 30 plus minows in at a time and they are gone within 12 hrs. The only ones that eat pellets/flakes were 1 in +/- yoy. They never made it however.