I had one once before someone walked off with it, and had a little luck a few times. My dad used them quite a bit when I was a kid to keep food on the table. He was a barber, so we didn't grow up rich, but never starved. He said cottonseed cake was a good bait for them, but I've not seen it around here in a long time. Only thing I could find (when I was looking) was soybean cake, and they said it doesn't work as well. Be sure to weight it down with something, because if you attract enough turtles and they all drown, they can float the entire net up. I had that happen once....very nasty, but underneath them, I had some nice cats in the net.