Kemper Lake and

Took my cousin to Kemper for his 1st time trolling. All he ever knew was fishing for those nasty green things.

We ended up with 17 decent fish. We'd of really put a hurting on em, but we ran out of minnows. We had well over 3 dozen die on us using better bait in a yeti cooler with cold water... I dunno...

We were fishing 9 feet deep in the morning and 12-13 feet deep by 9:30 or so- all in 12-16 FOW straight minnows on 6lb. flouro bumping brush tops.
Attachment 268152


For the Lowrance guys, here is a link to an AT5 that I made of the MDWFP's Kemper Lake map that you can load onto a card and put on your unit for a basemap. You copy the entire folder called "Bound AT5s" to a blank card and then turn on shaded relief in the chart options menu. Next time ya go to Kemper, load it up, they can be really helpful: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/9f97ahk9a...uRgnaYo3a?dl=0

It'll look similar to this screenshot of my unit:

Attachment 268153

Good catch. Too bad your minnows died. You mentioned that you had them in cold water. That could have been the problem. If your water was more that 3 or 4 degrees colder that the water in the bait shop they probably died from thermal shock. Most bait shops keep their bait at around the 60 degree level. You can keep minnows alive very well all the way to freezing, but you have to temper them a couple of degrees at a time. Also, it doesn't take much better bait in a cooler that size. 1 tablespoon treats 50 gallons.

Jigflinger, the place where I got the minnows is notorious for having their bait die once they leave the tank. In the past I've tried to match what temp the tanks were at with a little better success, but these minnows start dying before I even get to the lake- which is a 10 minute ride. Why, I do not know; as I've tried different tanks, aerators, you name it?

I always keep a couple of cubes of ice in the baitwell, and I never have problems anywhere else. Sometimes I think that they die because the store where they come from always has minnows, but I sometimes think that's because they have a low demand for them. I'd think that if they sat in a tank for months on end, they'd be more susceptible to dying if any type of stress and/or change was induced.

Far as Better Bait goes, you betcha money I do the bare minimum on that stuff! I actually measured out the weight of 1 tbsp. of the stuff and then figures up what the weight was in oz./lb. I've got a custom measuring spoon from a tuna fish packet that puts the exact amount per gallon of water.:yikes

If your ice was made with tap water...it could have chlorine, ect. In it

Nah, the ice I use the same that's in my 1 gallon thermos. It's from local spring water, and it's all I drink and use, other than for my caffeine/ snack cooler.

Again, I never have issues anywhere else- only there, and it's a known problem for the few folks I know that get their minners there (or even crappie fish Kemper, for that matter.

Wow! Nice crappie.

Nice catch Slater!! Not to be a smarty pants, but I would conclude that they sell shoddy minners.. I know of two places (local) I wouldn't take them for free, be no use.. just have a bait cooler full of dead ones in an hour or two. I will drive out of my way a bit to get good minners when I have to have them. If no other bait shops within reasonable distance, I would look into making a minner tank and keep my own. And to be fair to bait shops, I found keeping minners alive in Summer extremely difficult, even when buying from the same reputable shops I did in the spring and fall. Either way 17 ain't too shabby :highfive

Get you some small water bottles or juice bottles, fill with water and freeze. Go to that minnow store, make him fill your bucket with his water. After you go back to boat put one of those bottles in the bucket. It will cool that water much slower than your ice cubes and stay cooler a lot longer. Shock of different water plus rapid cooling could be your problem.

What cray said.....been doing it for years.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-J320A using Tapatalk

I will definitely try that Cray.

Snubbys, I'm right there with ya. My only reason for not going 30 minutes outta the way was because it was a 1st time troller and we were doing the hardest kind of trolling: taking 16 hooks and intentionally ramming them into thick brush piles. I wasn't sure how long we'd be before my sanity dissolved into madness! However he did better, by far, than any person I've ever taken trolling on tending his poles. Runs in the family I guess lol!

On another note, the fish were biting very light. And since the lines are always sitting hung up in a brush piles, it's near impossible to see line movement. We had at least 2 dozen minnows stolen and/or missed the bite because the movement we finally did see was when they were spitting the hook. This has always been a problem bumping brush piles with Kentucky rigs, for me at least. I picked up some new offset octopus hooks, real small, and tried em for the 1st time, and they worked flawlessly. In fact, they saved the day. Since so many fish-on's were not seen until they spit the hook, it made the instinct to set the hook non-existent. Therefore the offset circle hooks set the hook for us when they tried to spit it out. I will definitely keep more of these in my arsenal!

Will too much Better Bait cause minnows to die?

Nice looking mess. Makes me homesick . Used to fish Kemper a couple times a week. Never fished with minnows just straight jigging. Caught several nice limits there. Next time your minnows die try a black/ orange jig. Those big specks love them this time of the year.

I'll do it gcor!

Interesting you say black/orange jig. The best color crankbait I've found for Kemper is the black and orange crawfish color. They love it.