A friend at work told me to put crappie on ice in the summertime instead of livewell because of the heat. Is this true?

Only if you don't intend to let them go.

They will keep better on ice.

Absolutely...the warmer the water = the less oxygen the water can hold. Once the water is above about 80 degrees, I just have ice in the livewell instead of water

You have two choices for your livewell once the water temps get around 90:
- fill the well with ice
- Or...you can keep the livewell water cool with a bag of ice every now and then. The cooler water will hold oxygen better, and keep them alive. I've kept plenty of crappie alive this time of year by doing this, but prefer to just toss them on ice.

Just drop em straight in da skillet! You could just about cook em without gas this time of year!

Slew

Duck,

Do you put the ice in the water directly or do you keep the ice in the bag and put the bag in the water?

For tournaments where you have to bring them in live, we toss a 20lb bag of ice in the livewell and fill it up. All of the ice will melt within minutes but, the water temp will be 70-74 instead of 87-90.

Use store bought ice because they treat the water to get the chlorine out before they freeze it. That is unless you have well water, then you can use ice from the house.

I put the bag in the livewell...and it will melt down from there.

You can also freeze some water in coke bottles and put them in there. Just keep a stash of those in a cooler, and you are good for all day fishing in 90 degree water

Good idea. Thanks for the suggestion.

My buddie and I just take ice from the cooler from time to time and toss it in the livewell to help keep the water temp down. The crappie are going to be shocked just from pulling them up from the 12'-20' deep, cooler waters. As long as you dont stay out on an all day, sun up to sun down, fishing trip they should still be alive but dont expect them to be "lively". If you have a long drive home then I would put them on ice in a cooler.

Last time out I also put the ice bag right in my live well in the bag and added some frozen water bottles in too.

That is one thing we keep in the freezer, lots of plastic bottles filled with water and frozen. I use them for the fish as well as to some small ones to put in the minnows to keep the water cooler if I am using them like at night (only time I take minnows).

For me, straight to the ice is the thing. The meat ends up being firmer and fresher.

I fill up 3 rectangular metal cake pans and freeze them. When its time to go fishing I just dump the blocks in.

A solid block of ice in the live well works better than cubes. As other have stated, keeping the water cool is the key. Having a deep/well insulated live well works better also.

On another note, I always carry an ice chest with ice to put the fish in. I hate cleaning out the live well and the way it smells from putting fish in it.

when you get your boat loaded onto the lake put the plug in the livewell and put a good amount of ice in there. I turn on the aerator and fill it about half way with the lake water, and that melts the ice and keeps the water really cold.

You only have to turn on the aerator occasionally with the livewell plugged up because the water is really cold and holds alot of oxygen. Not only that the really cold water calms 'em down or half freezes them don't know which. Anyway sometimes they float in my live well, but once they warm up they are FIESTY for the fillet knife!!!!

How come no one has mentioned adding anything like Rejuvenade or Please Release Me to the livewell? We do that first thing in the morning during a bass tournament and manage to keep fish alive all day. The frozen water bottles also works good too.