Sometimes I buy minnows the night before I go fishing and put them in my small frig. while they are in the plastic air filled bag. they are still alive the next morning. I think putting a cold bottle of water in my bucket when I reach my destination helps also.

I use the same chemical that makes the water blue and safe for the minnows. Buy from Boat Cycle in Henderson, Tx. Also keep my cooler in the house several hours before putting minnows in it. I also keep in house over night. I also use frozen coke. Bottles.

Have always used a dechlorinator that I’ve used in my aquariums. Keeping the water cool and clean is important. I would not use well water, it often has sulfur and other chemicals present that will kill minnows pretty quickly. If you need to keep them overnight, I recommend putting the cooler inside this time of year unless you have a cooler that is very well insulated. More often than not it’s about the quality of the bait rather than the way you keep it. If the bait store wasn’t keeping them very well, oftentimes they won’t survive for very long. I always get wild shiners that are fresh and lively straight from the creek and do not have issues keeping them even in a 5 gallon bucket, so hopefully you have a good bait store. If you want to cool them off, put ice in a ziploc bag and double bag it, this is very important, frozen bottles and things of this nature run the risk of leaking and adding chlorine to the system which will quickly the minnows.