I bought a scoop of fathead minnows, scoop of tiny suckers, and 6 large suckers.
I placed them all into this minnow bucket that had an aerator going into it constantly. After an hourish though, most of my bait were dying or dead. This is in Minnesota so temperature wise it was warm right now. My guesses it could’ve been either the water temperature inside the minnow bucket being warm, too much live bait in a small space, or my aerator isn’t strong enough. The picture I added above is the same size I placed all those live bait in. Purpose of the post is to figure out why all my live bait died to prevent me from losing my money on live bait and keep the live bait alive!
Posted by Middle-Cookie-5318
2 Comments
Most likely ran out of oxygen in the water. I put my minnow bucket in the body of water I’m fishing and they don’t die due to the water being constantly replaced. But if I just leave the bucket on shore they die in the Texas heat in 30 minutes. So I’d say try just keeping them under the water with the bucket LOCKED(found that out the hard way when I pulled it out of the water and I had no bait left lol). Sorry for the novel.
You’re probably right on all accounts. Too hot, too many, not enough air to go around. Next time, throw ice in the bucket every half hour or so. Just a handful or 2. And run a larger aerator or tandem aerators with larger stones.
Don’t use that minnow bucket. Make your own next time. Get a new 5 gallon bucket and Gamma Lid kit. Find halfway up the bucket mark it with a sharpie. Using a paddle bit or any bit in the 1/4-1/2″ range (depending on what your usual bait size is, go a 1/16″ smaller), drill random holes ABOVE the halfway point of the bucket. Take the metal handle off and replace it with small double braid nylon like clothes line and figure 8 it into the old handle sockets. Heres a pic. Sorry its dark but its 530 am.
Let me know if you want me to walk you thru it a bit more.
https://preview.redd.it/lbaogrhgz5if1.jpeg?width=3000&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f2f529b94af9e5a00419e6fed119053fe274decd
Edit: Adding ice takes care of all 3 problems. Cools them off which slows down their metabolism so they use less air.