Night Stalking, Wild or Bait Store

[puddle jumper]

Guys,
If you dont mind shairing some advice, Im going to give night stalking a try this Wed night up on Carters " if the storms arent to bad", from what I here there are a ton of blue backs up there, so bait should be all over the place,,, Do you guys ever us the wild bait thats around the lights?? , Or do you go and buy the bait store on the way to the lake???, What are the avantages of one or the other, seems to me like the wild bait would be what the fish are used to eating, but I hav'nt read about people using wild bait...

Also cast net or dip net??? Seems like a cast net would be a over kill around the lights...and I dont want to run the bait off..

Thanks for the help...I will let you guys know how it goes and try to get a few pics ,,Im also hopeing for walleye around the light,,I have read about fishing the same way for them and there are suposed to be some good ones up on that lake...im going to try the standing timber, if anyones on the lake stop by and say Hi,, Im in a gray 17' Al.Triton with a big rod holder on the back...

PJ

[gabowman]

In alot of cases it can take up to an hour sfter dark for the bait to surface. You can sometimes see the bait on the graph moving under the boat at 10' deep or more and every so often theyll move up until you can finally see 'em. At other times the baitfish can be in your light in no time at all. Lastly, there are times that no baiftfish show up on a particular night. Shad is the baitfish I'm referring to, not bluebacks. IMO bluebacks aint gonna catch you any crappie. Again, IMO, a storebought minnow (shiner) aint gonna run from the crappie as much as a shad will. The lesser aggressive crappie may still take the minnow where he might not run the shad down.

I always take my minners with me. I wanna fish instead of trying to catch bait.:o

[score300]

There was a time last year that I ran out of minnows so I used my net and scooped up a bunch of shad... The shad died off quickly. I'd stick with store bought except in emergency.

[clark_kent]

I've done as score did and fished bait I caught around my light along side store bought the store bought seemed to catch fish better/quicker but I have noticed that if the bait fish/shad are smaller than the minnows the fish are a little more finicky. I prefer to take my minnows with me as well, just my 2 cents.

Mike

[puddle jumper]

Thanks guys,
That makes sence,,ok for the store bought minnows,
This time of year med or small???
I know they might be dumb questions, but I'm really trying to learn...
PJ

[crappiechappy]

We always keep the minnows after they die just in case we are running close on bait. One night we were catching them really steady, plus the little cats were biting and we ran out of minnows. We started using the dead minnows that we had saved and caught considerably better quality crappie on them then we had been catching with the live ones. That's the truth, but in most cases I prefer a fresh very lively minnow.

[gabowman]

I've not done much night fishing during the warm months. I prefer the cold months for night fishing personally. I like the small minnows, but with water temps like they are, I'd buy medium minnows now. They are a bit hardier than the smalls IMO.

[Tracy Swanson]

get your minnows a day or two before you fish let them get use to warm water they will last longer and wont die in our bait bucket wile you are fishing good luck on your night stalk you will love it

[puddle jumper]

Thanks again Guys,,
Man I pumped about it hope we do some good tonight...
PJ