A bag of ice does the same thing. I like frozen bottles of treated lake water.

I would spend the extra money and add an O2 system before I would spend "only $35" to cut holes in the lids of my livewells. If they work for you, that's great. I'll continue to use ice and please release me.

why lake water? Dont you leave the lid on the bottles and drop them in to work as ice blocks?

OK. And that’s everyone’s prerogative. My point has been that cost wise these are much cheaper and cut out the need to use anything else. No ice, no G juice or additives. Just the vents. But everyone is free to do what they want. Kudos to you sir. Best of luck in your fishing.

It's always amazed me how heated this topic seems to get at times. Several great solutions appeared to be offered here and they are the same ones that are offered and argued about each and every time this topic comes up.

I still vividly recall the fish care "seminar" that was at the team meeting and calcutta for the first Fun and Sun charity tourney on Squaw Creek before it re-opened to the public. A lot of common sense stuff that seemed to work as we had no issues with our fish that day and had something like 20# for 3rd place.

So whether you prefer frozen treated water bottles, fin clips, vents in your live well, the Oxygenator and/or a pure O2 system or whatever, just do what you think works for you and if it doesn't then try something else that has worked for someone else. If I fished tourney in the Summer I would probably add a pure O2 system set up to my boat.

I treat the bottles with catch and release. I take the lids off so it slowly releases as the ice melts. I add bottles as needed to keep water cool. At the end of the day I just refill with more water and or refreeze bottles I didn't open. Maybe it's overkill I don't know. Personally, I like knowing there are zero chemicals added to the water from the ice. Only the catch and release and pure oxygen.

Gotcha, I figured if your just using them for cooling you would not need to open and ever re fill them. Just trying to understand so I can use it if the need comes up.

If you want to do something for you livewells. This is what you do:

https://www.slideshare.net/raminlandfish/livewell-oxygen-injection-8773301?next_slideshow=1

Best $300 I have ever spent and it is easy to install

Fishied 84-88 degree water this past weekend for a championship.

Filled livewells full and plugged them off. No more new water the rest of the day
At 9a, 11a and 1p I put a 3 liter frozen bottle of water in the livewell. Dropped the temp about 6 degrees
Had the oxygen injection system on and running.

At weigh in when I was trying to get he fish out of the weigh basket, that where flopping all over the place to the extent of about 3 ft high.

one of the key ingredients of catch and release is an additive that calms and relaxes the fish so they don't injure themselves or loose more weight trying to escape the livewell. please release me has additives to help injuries and bleeding.

If you leave a sponge or floating two liter bottle in there it goes a long ways to calm them down it gives them something to be under. It absolutely makes a difference.

I have had some sponges in there this year and only hear them thrash around coming off plane usually.

Sedate is a better word. Catch and release chills em out for sure. They don't move

It's not sedation. I know the ingredients and the specific additive very well. It's a calming agent. I made the product for SureLife in Seguin, TX.

Good to know....they sure act sedated haha

Exactly, imagine a trophy buck left in the back of a 53ft semi trailer for hours.

VT-2 livewell vents make sense to me. They get fresh air into the live well which is otherwise pretty much a closed system except for any water pumped in. They cause evaporative cooling. The presence of fresh air in the live well would cause recirculation to be more effective in picking up oxygen from the air. If people who use them say they work I would tend to think they might be worth a try. (If you could stand to cut a couple holes in your boat).