I know a bait tank is the way to go, but has anyone kept shad alive in the summer for more than a couple of hours in their livewell? I know years ago I caught some, ran across the lake and some of them already started floating.

I will try to add salt this time, and some air to help out. How long can they last?

About 10 minutes in a square livewell with no current.

They died in my live well. If it�s square they will kill themselves. I have a Moeller non insulated 30 gal tank. I add 10 lbs of ice, salt and a keep alive aerator, and more ice if they get hot. You need all that for a round live well and probably some foam away as well...

They died in my live well. If it�s square they will kill themselves. I have a Moeller non insulated 30 gal tank. I add 10 lbs of ice, salt and a keep alive aerator, and more ice if they get hot. You need all that for a round live well and probably some foam away as well...

The truth about using bait for stripers is:

You need a round or oval bait tank.
Circulation and aeration.
Rock salt

Don�t be lazy or cheap when it comes to catching and keeping bait!

Healthy 5�inch gizzard shad put limits of Stripers in the boat.

Healthy 6�to 8� gizzard shad put big fish in the boat.

In a round bait well that constantly circulates fresh water in, you�ll get a couple of hours. In a square one, 20 minutes if you�re lucky

^^^^^^^
Key word here is "Healthy"

When fishing for stripers, there is a difference in live shad & lively shad.
Many times, live shad are not good enough.

X1000

If you do not have a bait tank designed to keep shad alive and put rock salt and shad keeper in it, best bet is to go with perch. I've been able to catch a dozen of so perch pretty quick using worm pieces and a number 10 hook around boat docks and boat launches. A 7 foot net will catch them pretty quick as well around boat launches and swim beaches. Those perch fish about as good as shad in my opinion. It does not take much to keep them alive, they don't stink as bad and they don't get scales all over your boat.

I have often wondered why boat manufacturers don't have an option to integrate a shad tank into these fishing boats in leiu of one of the live wells. Since I don't fish tournaments I have turned all my live wells into dry storage anyway.

A $600 to $700 investment into a bait tank is a smart move. Well worth the money. Tons of great tanks out there! Tho keep alive tanks aren't one of them.

I lost several fish overnight last night....put probably over a hundred threadfin and gizzards in my 30 gallon blue water bait tank and it just got too hot and most of them were dead by morning. In spring or fall they would have stayed alive but its just too dang hot. I plan to invest in an electric chiller soon to keep the water a cooler temp while storing. If I catch bait at the lake and go fishing they are fine but overnight several hours they start dying without controlling temp. Adding salt is a great idea but big issue is the heat.

You mention rock salt. Is this any different than what is in water conditioner or pool salt? I know not to use salt with iodine in it.
How much salt for each ten gallons?

Ice cream rock salt seams to be what most people use. Up to a cup per 10 gallons which I think is excessive.

Ice cream salt or I buy cattle salt in a 35lb bag at feed store.

Salt and or Shad keeper will help but you will still have a bunch of shad die off. They will lose their scales and puke and poop and mess up the water. I have to keep several spare filters in my boat and change them out often if I fish with shad. They have to be the nastiest fish alive. I'm usually finding shad scales everywhere for days after fishing with shad.

As for water temp I have put frozen water bottles in the tank to cool it down but it does not seem to help a whole lot. Best bet is to catch them and use them quick. Guides like Randy Wood would know all the tricks however to keep shad alive as they catch shad the day before a guide trip and it would be a disaster for them to wake up to a tank full of floaters and have to get bait before they went out or just fish lures.