Sticklebacks for bait

I have read good and bad reports on using sticklebacks for bait (walleye and other species).
I put a minnow trap out this morning for two hours and came up with 4-5 dozen sticklebacks. Nothing else. What are your thoughts on using them for bait for walleye? How about other species?

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The dont work

Don’t work very well, winter never have caught a fish with one.

Hmmmm, that seems to be the prevailing sentiment but others have tried them side by side with fatheads and couldn’t buy a bite on the fatheads when they were getting plenty of fish on the sticklebacks.

If I can find some fish during my camping trip, I will give them a shot and report back.

I wouldn’t waste my time with them

I still give them a shot, but don’t recall ever catching a fish with one, ever.

I think they are right up there with having bananas in the boat …

So nothing eats sticklebacks and they have a free ride through life?

targaman wrote:

So nothing eats sticklebacks and they have a free ride through life?

Thats why I still give em a shot everytime I get one with the rest of minnows, somethings got to eat one!!

Honestly, been thinking about it and not one fish ever

Heard about someone getting lost while on a lake one time and they had one in the minnow bucket. They ended up finding the guy without one foot.:???: He ate that too survive,instead of throwing out the Stickleback? True story or not I don’t know. Even snoops won’t cover it. Ya they are that bad.

Always the last minnow to go on a hook and always the last one one ice with no bite marks on it

Well, I just got back from my camping trip. And halfway there, I realized my stickelbacks were still in the garage in a bucket with the aerator running. Oh well, I stopped and picked up a dozen fatheads. I caught three walleyes with some casual shore fishing. But the stickeleback experiment will have to wait.

Broke the lifelong curse this AM!!

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What the heck is that thing. It looks like a cross between a Musky and a trout…lol.

And you caught it on a Stickleback?

Big stickle

I absolutely smash the walleye with them , whenever i get a scoop of fatheads and get lucky to get one or too of them they usually always produce fish . No bs true story

Very common to clean spring lake trout and find stickel backs in stomach

Yes, I saw a lot of posts of people cleaning walleyes and finding sticklebacks loaded in the stomach. Also, the DNR has logged the same.
I may have to get another batch of them to take fishing for some walleyes next time I go camping.

Idk… caught plenty of walleye on stickleback, mostly ice fishing

i remembered this post as i was gettin a minnow last Friday croppie fishin. in my minnow scoop was a stickleback. told my bud about this post and how ive nvr caught a fish on them.
so he decides to use it and catches the biggest crop and 11″ of the day.
he turns to me says they’re awesome and asked if we had anymore sticklebacks
smh
imma chalk it up to the crops are on FIRE and literally will hit anything even sticklebacks lol

I read a post on another forum of a couple guys out ice fishing for Crappie and were doing poorly until one guy stuck on a stickleback and got a bite in seconds. He put another one on and got another fish right away, then put a regular crappie minnow on and nothing. Switched back to a stickleback and was back in the game in seconds. Then they ran out of sticklebacks and were lucky to get a bit every ten minutes.
I would love to give them a try, but the place I get them is out in the open and too many people drive by. They always slow down to see what I am doing. It is just below a bridge over a stream. I am afraid someone is going to call the DNR and report me for taking baitfish away from the water source which is illegal in Wisconsin.

Sticklebacks are great. If you don’t want em, feel free to give them to me! Walleye candy, just like creek chubs and mud minnows.