Keeping Minnows Alive

[THUMPER]

My buddy and I are looking at keeping minnows for ourselves and some buddies this year. We have always trapped our own but have a hard time in the dog days of summer. We lose our minnows even when we keep them as cool as we can after a week or so. We use well water changed every three or so days. I run a small aerator. Any advice. Thanks for any replies in advance.

[Eyesrfn]

the best way I've kept minnows alive in the summer is to go out and buy a older chest type of deep freezer. Make sure that it still runs and there are no holes in it, fill it up with water and plug it in. See if the water gets cold, keeps minnows fora long time in the dog days of summer just rememer to unplug it now and than or you may get to cold of water. I have used a thermomator to keep track of the water temp around 45 F works good.

[Fin Addict]

If you use well water, I assume there is no clorine. Put the minnows in a tank and just run the water at a trickle constantly. Drill out the tank and add an overflow hose at the top to drain excess. Could also look at a Minnow Miser unit if you really want to go nuts but they are very spendy. Few dead minnows either way. The key is to avoid too much amonia build up in the water. Cool but not icy cold seems to work best around 50-60 degrees.

[ryan the poor college kid]

this is off the subject, but can i ask you what kinds of traps you use. i live right behind a creek and want to set out minnow traps this year, but would like to know what brand to buy.

[the legend]

we always jump in the creek and use a saigning net. but we used to use minnow traps up in canada. they were pretty slick they were basically a wire mesh cylinder with a open end cone going inside each end, put some crackers inside and set near shore. we used to fly in so we had to get our own live minnows.

[THUMPER]

I buy the round cylinders with the holes in each end. There are new ones out now that are epoxy painted in black. They are an improvement over the galvanized ones of years ago. We used to paint the galvanized ones but now do not have to.