What do you guys use to keep your shad fresh during the hot days of summer? I normally use an igloo cooler packed with ice but the ice seems to melt pretty fast and my bait gets saturated in the cold water and I don't feel it is as good when that happens, I've also tried putting ice in my livewell but that seems to melt the ice faster. I'm thinking I just need a better grade cooler. I tried to tell my wife I need the 20qt Yetti but she shot that down quickly when she looked at prices and what I would be using it for. Any opinions or recommendations are appreciated.

Bag your shad and ice down. I use frozen gallon jugs usually.

Thanks Tom, I will give the frozen jugs a try

Tupperware works great for keeping shad fresh. Easy clean up too.+1 on the frozen jugs too.

I didn't think of the tupperware, I might have to try that as well

Sprinkle salt on ice and put shad in zip lock bag. Will last all day.

I usually use gallon ziplock bags as well. I'll throw 10-20lbs of ice in the cooler and lay the ziplock bags of shad on top of the ice. That way the shad don't freeze. If I'm planning on catching a bunch to use for a few days I will put some ice in the cooler the night before to cool it down. If you put ice in a hot cooler it will melt much more quickly.

I cut them and bag them as I bag them I will add a little reg. salt to the cut shad and salt the ice that makes them supper cold and a little Reg. salt in the bag will make them a litle tougher.

Thanks for all the feedback! Some good ideas for me to try out.

Another thing that i did was to build a 1x4 frame to fit the bottom of the ice chest and staple some 1/4 hardware cloth to the top of the frame. As the ice melts it goes through the cloth keeps the water from setting in the ice.

Never put the shad directly on the ice, the chlorine in the ice gets into the meat and the water flushes all the juices out of the bait, like tom said keep them in gallon baggies and put the bags directly on ice

We take old juice jugs and fill them with water and freeze them. We place a couple of them in the bottom of the ice chest and add some ice in the summer. Those big chunks of ice in the bottles will keep all day. I do agree with bagging your fresh bait. Keeps the scent fresh.

I like block ice with a damp towel over it. Place Shad On the towel. Try to keep the cooler as full as possible with ice. A full cooler is an efficient cooler.