keeping fish alive in summer?

[Jigaman]

Any tips on this? Fished last saturday for about 8 hours and most of the walleye in the livewell were belly up by the time we came in. I had it set on recirculate all day. They dont look real appetizing when they are pale and stiff but they tasted fine. When the water is cooler I dont have any problems. 1999 tyee

 

[guywhofishes]

cooler, ice, fish'n whacker

I still have the one my mom gave me for my birthday in 1978 for whacking carp we shot bowfishing. Thanks Mom!

 

[H82bogey]

I never trust the circulate feature on the boat. I always refresh the water when I think they need it. If you are pulling fish up from deep water, that does have an effect on them.

 

[sierra1995]

If i plan on being out for a long time i will pack a cooler with ice or frozen milk jugs in the boat, then just put all the fish in there as you catch them. I don't put any water in the cooler with the ice jugs, as it just thaws the ice faster.

 

[Up Y'oars]

I tend to forget, but I'd rather bleed them out and be prepped for shore/cleaning station. My boat (Skeeter) not only has a recirc switch, but also a timing adjustment so I can have it replace the water more often than normal, depending on temps. I know I have to keep the rheostat set higher if I'm carrying minnow aboard (same timer).

 

[Colonel Angus]

When the top water is warm, the only reason I can see for a live well is for tournaments or for bleeding the fish or maybe you have little ones that like watching the fish swim around. I haven't done many tourneys and haven't got into the habit of bleeding the fish, so it's the cooler with ice trick for me, even with bait (crawlers and leeches).

 

[Davey Crockett]

The first guy to invent a retractable drop tube that pulls cooler water from 3 feet below the surface wins.

 

[Jigaman]

my old boat had a very small livewell so I used to use a cooler and ice. I could do that now but am trying to avoid bringing another large cooler when the boat is already full.

 

[guywhofishes]

Firm cold fish are way nicer to filet I know that!

 

[sweeney]

why not just run new water in the livewell instead of recirculating, only time I use the recirc pump is when I am running on plane, otherwise I pump new water on them and they stay alive all day until I cut them

 

[Vollmers]

X2

why not just run new water in the livewell instead of recirculating, only time I use the recirc pump is when I am running on plane, otherwise I pump new water on them and they stay alive all day until I cut them

 

[gonefshn]

X2

What they said. Recirculate won't keep them alive very long. They need fresh water.

 

[NDwalleyes]

I hate when fish die and I absolutely hate mushy / smelly fish.

I buy 40 lbs of ice and put it in a cooler in the back of my truck. When I arrive at my fishing spot, I put that 40 lbs of ice in my live well and leave the drain plug IN. Throw the fish on ice as I catch them. The ice melts during the outing. I spoke with GnF about doing this and the law requires you to drain the water from the melted ice that is in the live well (along with everything else). You can just leave the drain plug open as you drive home and let the melted ice run out. The ice in the well is legal.

 

[guywhofishes]

I didn't see the "recirc" part in the OP - why recirc at all rather than draw in fresh water? Doesn't save electricity or anything does it?

my front livewell doesn't even HAVE a recirculator

I converted my big transom well to a cooler long ago

maybe the freshwater intake doesn't have a timer?

 

[Jigaman]

I have to look at how my switches are labeled when I get home. In my head, I thought I had it so every 5 minutes or so it would pump fresh water in the well for 30-60 seconds. Now Im not sure what was happening.

I have a selector switch like above that I have on recirculate. Then next to it I have a switch that is I think manual/off/auto. what should I be using?

 

[shorthairsrus]

Mine has a pickup system on it -- it pumps water when in gear and going across the lake. Recirculate only used if one wants to violate the ANS rules in the spring or summer with minnows.

 

[Jigaman]

- - - Updated - - -

this is the switch I was trying to show

- - - Updated - - -

Im failing at interneting today.

 

[Kickemup]

I have always just kept fresh water pumping into the livewell. How are u going to keep those big Muskie fresh for the pickle jar.

 

[LBrandt]

My Alumacraft has a auto or manual switch for pumping water through live well works well until temps get close to 90s. Then I make room for cooler with liter pop bottles of frozen water. Fish go direct to cooler from lake, like said before makes a lot nicer to filet a stiff fish. But one word of caution, couple of buddies a I were fishing Bitter Lake in SD. when they had a minimum size of 15" and it was hotter then hell out so fish were going direct to cooler half full of ice. We were sizing each fish on a plastic ruler thing on cooler to make sure of 15" because that was the size that was biting that day. Well we got checked by warden and sure enough 3 of our 15" had shorted up to 14 3/4 Well we argued the hot to cold water thing to no avail, even brought up the GEORGE factor. Warden laughed and gave us a 75.00 fine and took the small fish. After that I give a 1/2" shrink factor on min size on hot days. #$%^&>;:;rofl

 

[johnr]

I like my fish flopping on the table while I slice into them, keeping them spunky and lively is my ultimate goal.

To eff around with ice and stinky coolers is so below me.

I run my livewells on recirculate, and auto fill. They run opposite of each other, when its topping off the water the recirc is not running and vise versa.

Ice...pppfffttt. that's nonsense