Crappie are meat fish, and they use jigs around here off poles...lots of poles. It's a harvest more than fishing. They are delicious. I catch a few on a wooley booger, but never fish for them. They give up pretty easily, even the big ones.
Down South, all panfish, sunfish, bluegill and mostly catagorized as "bream." Pronounced "brim." A bream that weighs a pound will give you a turn. He is a scrappy fellow and not afraid to die. But the majority aren't big enough to give a lot of sport, but they sure taste great.
As for catching other fish with a flyrod, I've caught my biggest trout, which probably weighed 10 pounds, on a 5wt rod and a 4x tippet. And I've caught many, many 3-5 pound bass on that rod. I now use a 6wt rod for bass and bream, as it's the right length for pond fishing from a boat (it's a lot easier to cast standing than sitting.)
When I go river trout fishing, I drop down to a 7'6" or 7' 9" 4wt rod, or an Orvis Far and Fine.
