For a $300 upgrade to the cooler, you can ride it to your favorite spot.
catillac
Posts: 89
IDO » Forums » Fishing Forums » Mississippi River » Mississippi River – Catfish » Portable Bait Cooler For Cat Bait
For a $300 upgrade to the cooler, you can ride it to your favorite spot.
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For a $300 upgrade to the cooler, you can ride it to your favorite spot.
now if only that thing had rod holders
I knew they would start making stuff for us catguys sooner or later!
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I use the even cheaper model that you can find at Wally World – just a submergible pump with an arm that sticks up and sprays back down into the cooler – it’s about $25.00. The only drawback is that it heats the water a bit, so in the summer you’ll want to add ice to counter that. As long as you keep it clean it keeps the water very oxygenated and the spraying helps remove ammonia.
I use the same thing. Have had good luck with it, but yeah it will cook that bait if your not careful
Also helps to rinse out the filter in fresh water every so often.
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PS It’s about time we get a true NE cat guy in here!
Glad to finally find my way over here! Where have I been???!?!?
I’ve actually been using the pump with that SeaLink plug on there for quite a few years…at least 5. And it works great, I’ve had no problems with it at all. It’ll be fired up soon too….the flattys will be aggressive shortly!!
That trash can stuff sounds like a lot of work. Changing water every day? With a proper filter, I didn’t change the water in my 55 last year. I know we make compromises though. The basement works well when it gets hot out.
I got a bubbler like this one last year. http://www.frabill.com/cgi-bin/frabill/1424?store=spring
It is super quiet compared to the walmart ones. It gets annoying when you are sitting in a nice quiet spot and blblblblblblblbl of the $6 aerator won’t stop. Not only are they loud, but when you quit hearing the blblblblblblbll, it died and your trip is messed up. A bit on uniodized salt will help fish cope with ammonia poisoning and other things. It is in the water though, and I don’t think you can aggitate it out. Only so much bait needs to die….
Sadly, the new laws you guys get to live under make it sound like you will kill more bait than I will this year. Can you dump them in the river or do you need to carry them home out of water?
On a brighter note, i did put some goldfish in the bait tank to get it cycled because of these conversations.
And time to get a new improved headlamp for the new year. Did you know there are new flashlights with 2x the brightness for the same battery power? Headlamps soon to follow..
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A bit on uniodized salt will help fish cope with ammonia poisoning and other things. It is in the water though, and I don’t think you can aggitate it out. Only so much bait needs to die….
Actually, you can agitate ammonia out pretty easily – just not with a bubbler. If you have a recirculating spray like the ones described above, the ammonia will dissipate out – it is much more volatile (evaporates more quickly) than water, it just needs a little more exposure to the air.
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Also helps to rinse out the filter in fresh water every so often.
Very much so – I made the holes bigger in the PVC section so that it gets clogged less often (and plugged a couple of them so that the remaining ones still have high velocity). Still, the sponge on the bottom gets slimed (and scaled in WI) and you have to unplug it, take the pump out and apart and rinse the sponge in the lake. Very easy to know when it’s needed by the water flow – BrianK must not be attuned to that if he’s blowing out three pumps in a season! Or… he talks so much that he never hears the sound of the pump running…
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Or… he talks so much that he never hears the sound of the pump running…
BINGO!
I’ll probably just stick with the cooler and a jet pump. I never have more than a dozen anyway and I won’t keep them longer than a week or 2. I have to figure out a decent portable set up though. I’d like to have more than a bubbler as the bait seems more lively when you can keep a steady “current” circulating.
I’ll get a pic of mine up on here one of these days. I’m tellin ya…..for trips to and from the lake (I usually only use it for 2-3 hours at a time, 5-6hrs max at one time), it can’t be beat.
I was thinking of using my live well to transport to and from the river..well at least to the river…
But I don’t know what to do with the garbage if I did.
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