Any one else not a minnow fan in winter?

I admit it I do not use minnows or tip ups any more. Before I start I only fish sunnies and crappies. My hands just cant take the dipping in with cold minnow buckets suckers etc. I have almost become a skeleton waiting for the dead stick bite. Only caught 3 fish on a Minnow last year and they were sunfish go figure. Any one else here not use minnows or am I an odd man out? Pluses of not using minnows no cold hands, extra weight, wet car floors, They anchor you down if you have a dead stick or tip up out. plus I save a huge amount in money I just use spikes and plastics. Just curious

We trap minnows. And use them. But I use a minnow net.
But if I’m pan fishing I never use minnows

Panfish no minnows
Walleye and pike minnows come with.

Scooper…..heater….heavy latex gloves under your winter gloves.

Whole lotta solutions but I do agree minnow buckets in the winter are a PIA.

Craps and eyes love minnows. I try to have them every trip out. Deadstick gets the minnow.

Minnow head fan here.

Only on tip ups.

Waxies and euro larva for this guy

I buy a couple scoops every winter if I don’t have luck in my traps. 90% of lakes in my area are panfish lakes so unless I hit up ML, LOW, or UPRL no need. I freeze any dead ones and use the heads also.
I put my minnows in a small thermos and use a homemade minnow scoop that only scoops one at a time and drains the water so no cold hands.

I bought some second skin gloves from Striker this year. Holy crap are those amazing. Really help keeping your hands dry. Also using a scoop or net to keep your hands out of the water is key.

I still use tipups and minnows. My issue with them I seem to always buy too many and waste them. I think I’m going to build a bait tank this winter to keep them so I won’t have to buy so many.

Ripjiggen wrote:

Panfish no minnows
Walleye and pike minnows come with.

X2
I will use minnows for crappies at times. If it’s really cold and I’m just camping on a spot in the shack I like having a minnow down for crappies too.

I’m the exact opposite.

In Winter, minnows are 100x easier to keep alive. I set a bucket on the floor of my garage and throw in a handful of snow when I remember. This will keep crappie minnows/fatheads at least a couple weeks. If you try to change the water once or twice, a month is not unheard of. There are winter days on the river where crappies and perch want nothing except a crappie minnow lethargically wiggling around on a tip down or deadstick.

In summer, I will not sit and mess with inactive fish. It’s too easy to move someplace else. I rarely use live bait anymore in the summer as it’s more difficult to keep alive in the heat. With the warmer water far more fish are willing to hit cranks, plastics, spinner rigs, etc that let me move and cover water.

Some lakes are minnow lakes some are absolutely not. The minnow lakes the fish will eat something else on a good day, non minnow they just will not ever touch them.

Interesting responses all. I do use a scoop to get the minnows out but by far I catch more fish on just spikes and plastics. I like the screw on lid idea might use that in the spring for a few crappies from shore.

I’m gonna try hot dogs this year

Almost never go fishing without them. Crappie’s love minnow’s and I jig for eye’s with heads. Use an engel if there’s room or to save on weight just put them in a small cooler. As mentioned above they stay alive for weeks/months if cared for a little.

Engler cooler. The net that pulls out drains water. Bought it this past spring and figured it would do wonders in the winter. So far it has been a finger saver.

Ripjiggen wrote:

Panfish no minnows
Walleye and pike minnows come with.

X3

Waxies for panfish, minnows/heads for eye’s and pike.

I struggle to get crappies on wax worms or spikes in the same numbers that I do with minnows.

What are the tricks? I have heard of colored spikes (2-3), just barely going through the skin of a waxie and various other ideas, but I quit and go back to minnows when getting consistently out fished!!!

crappie55369 wrote:

Ripjiggen wrote:
Panfish no minnows
Walleye and pike minnows come with.

Exception, crappies either after dark or a second line when more stationary. Sometimes all they seem to want is a little crappie minnow wiggling. I’m also not talented enough to jig two lines at once. Don’t ask me to chew gum either

I’ll never fish walleyes without some meat. Always have a minnow head on a spoon and a dead stick with a live minnow. I probably catch just as many, if not more walleyes on the dead stick/venom bobber. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had my day saved on tough bites when they won’t hit anything I’m jigging and they pull a venom on neutral buoyancy down just a couple of inches before spitting it.

I also frequent a lake with large aggressive crappies, and I’ll use spoons with minnow heads there as well.

I do use Rippin Raps frequently, but I still always have my Engel with minnows in it.

I never leave home without em. I use minnows 80% of the time on ice, at least 80%.

Tip downs are deadly with minnows for crappies and perch. Tip ups for walleyes and pike are also a blast to fish with minnows. If you use a minnow net to get the minnow out of the water, your hands don’t get too cold. But if you don’t want to ice fish with minnows that means more fish for the rest of us.

Tip downs have saved the day several times for me-hoping the Finiky Fooler will replace the TD for me.

On the Mississippi backwaters I will run minnows on I Fish Pro’s and tip Downs for perch crappies and Pike but I’ll run El-naturelle on all sorts of VMC tungsten ice flies and plastics looking for that gill bite…