Keeping Bait Alive at Home Help
 

I would like some input on making a livewell of some sort that i could use at home to keep bait alive for a few days. My family has a shrimp boat and i would like to be able to keep a few hundred shrimp alive from when they go until i can use them to fish with. Anyone that has any input it would be greatly appreciated

Hopefully you will get some good answers to this, I would like to install a live bait system at my camp to keep a few live shrimp alive when we are there for an extended period.

is your home on the water or no? if it is then get a pool pump and suck it straight out the water(have a screen on the intake pipe) and into your big bait tank and on the the tank have an overflow pipe with a screen(to keep bait from escaping) that goes back to the water.

if you dont live on the water just make the pump recirculate the water in the tank. just make sure you have a screen on the intake pipe so you don't suck up your bait. I don't know how long bait will last in a tank without fresh water thought.

If you just recirculate, you will have to add some O2 and cool the water somehow. I used to know a guy that kept shrimp alive for 2 days or so on his boat. Haven't seen him in a few years though. i know he used oxygen to do it. His boat was on teh water.

These work
http://www.boydsonestop.com/oxygenresponse.html

I would agree, I have Jason Boyd's tank and it does work. Jason always is at the Houston Boat and Fishing shows for those of you that go. The last two years at the fishing show he had an aquarium there full of shrimp that he kept alive for days. My camp is on the water so it sounds like I may be able to keep my shrimp alive longer.

you will need to keep the water cooler too.

at least in the shade, if not have a chiller to keep the water below 90ish

yes i do live on the water but it is on a bayou off of lake p. and it is brackish water is that ok?

bait
 

Chas keeps his bait alive in his tanks at the dock and was doing so at his house. bothe are in eden isles off lake p. so you should be ok.

Saw them at the Houston Fishing Show.

I think it would be fine....get a few shrimp and give it a try.

I found our old 55 gallon saltwater aquarium tank and i am going to try to keep that in my garage and fill it with water from lake p. with 5 gallon buckets.

not going to work ,Shrimp need moving water . square corners will cause them to bunch up in a corner and die.you need a recirculating pump.

the water can be brackish, thats where shrimp spend most of their life

i do have a recirculating pump and it infuses outside air as it pumps

If I were to use a bait tank like the link below, in order to keep shrimp alive for over 48 hours would I need to have an inflow line from the canal in front of my camp or would a reticulating pump be enough? I have looked on the web today for a decent tank system without a great deal of success.
[SIZE=3] [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]If I did need an inflow pump, to pump water in from the canal, do an of you have a recommendation of where I could purchase a system that would work?[/SIZE]

http://www.piedmontbaittanks.com/1400Series.html

At Calcasieu Point, they have raw river water and oxygen in their tanks.

If you are on a canal, have you thought about dropping a live bait cage in the canal? Years ago, the bait camps didn't have pumps, they had cages made of cypress slats that they dropped in the water with a rope and pulley. If anyone is old enough, they might remember the cages at Joe Dugas's Landing on the west side of Big Lake. As long as you have good water flow and the surface water isn't too hot, they will stay alive a long time.

You saying I am old? I remember them when I was but a tot.

Hey, if the shoe fits? :) I don't remember when those old cages went away. Sometime in the 60's, I discovered an artificial called a Specs-a go-go. They were a jig head with a rubber worm shaped body, held on the jig head with a little o-ring. They were soon followed by Boone tout's. Once I discovered soft plastics, I quit buying live shrimp for a while.

I do remember them and I was probably 4 or 5 then. Also remember when the tout came ot. We never really used live, we would make a "drag" in Joe's Cove and catch some bait for reds. Dad didn't like them slimy fish "trout"

I made 2 cages last year for a Doctor that has a camp on Big Lake. I made them out of stainless and used thin sheet of stainless with little holes throughout it for the sides....He says it works great...

Bluechip,
Stainless perforated would be sweet. What were the dimensions? If I was going to experiment, I would probably make one out of 1/4" galvanized hardware cloth. It would easily last a year in brackish water.

One was 3'x4'x4' and the other was 4'x4'x4'....That is what he wanted....

I didn't charge him any money but I can stop by his camp anytime I want and get live bait for free....He has a shrimper go by once or twice a week (depends on how much night fishing he is doing) and refill his livewell...

Must be nice to be loaded....:D

i have a crab holding pen and i was thinking about trying to cover that with some smaller mesh to keep them in. havent figured out what to use though

I would buy some cheap window screen at first just to see if it will work. If it does then upgrade...

get some 1/4 " hardware cloth and make a round or oval cage inside your crab box and keep it in the water.

went out this evening and caught a few shrimp to test out the aquarium tank, if it works ok im going to buy a Keep Alive Recirculating pump and install it through the tank wall

I know where a huge plastic bait tank is washed up on the bank in prien lake if anyone wants it.

I got my tank set up the way i want it with a recirculating pump running off of a car battery but need to find a way to keep the battery charged or if i could just plug it into the wall somehow. Will upload some pictures tomorrow

i have kept shrimp alive at my house for as long as 5 days. I use 150 quart ice chests and i have saltwater aquarium equipment. a protein skimmer is the best thing that you could use to keep shrimp alive. it foams out all the waste that the shrimp generate and it pumps out super oxygenated water. i put around 150 shrimp in and fill with water about half way and run the skimmer. i usually go out one or 2 nights before i go fishing and get my shrimp to make sure i have enough to fish with. now mind you, a protein skimmer is going to cost you lots of money but they are very effective.

this is good information !!!!

I thought about getting a protien skimmer yesterday and have been looking at them on the internet and found some pretty cheap. What model do you have?

some pictures of my setup
 

the pump is a recirculating model made by rule that infuses outside air into the pump to add oxygen to the water. now i need o find something for my boat because the one in my boat is really small and it sucks big time

He ya go Jonathan......for your boat.

http://www.bestmaterials.com/images/4101large.jpghttp://image.basspro.com/images/images2/64000/64188.jpg
If you're looking to keep bait such as Shrimp alive this is the ticket! Drill the right size hole through the lid for the aerator, keep a couple frozen water bottles in it & they'll stay alive! You need to use the coolers with pull type lid, not screw on. This works 10x better than bait/live well in my bay boat.

how many shrimp can you keep in that?

I've put up to 150 w/o a problem.

btw you don't have to get the 10 gal, they make a 5 gal also. Them 10's are expensive!

I just completed the setup below at the camp today. Right now I have 125 gallons of water with a saltwater aquarium filter and pump. The system is rated to aerate 175 gallons. The tank is in the shade in my fish cleaning station which gets a nice breeze everyday. Right now I have 350 shrimp in there and will post to let everyone know how it goes. The entire setup was just under $400, for now. If this does not work and I have to buy a pool pump to pump new water in then obviously the cost will go up.

How long do you think I can keep these guys alive for in this setup? I also have a boyds one stop oxygen response system with pure oxygen I can put on them if I need to.

that thing is nice !!!!!

are your shrimp still alive in the tank you made?

Mine all died after two days. The water temperature was fine. I think I need more oxygen in the water so I will try again next week and use my oxygen response tank along with the pump I bought.

Keep us posted of your progress ckinchen

bait tanks
 

if you look at the bait tanks that the marinas use ,They are constantly recirculating the water. They pull the water from down in the water column cause it's cooler than the surface temp. they have a pump to pull water in and spray it and usually a overflow drain so as the water in the tank tops the drain it runs out. constant supply of cool fresh water is the key.
Same pricipal as a bait well on boat.

I am afraid you are right, I just need to step up and do it the right way if I want to keep the shrimp alive.