With the eel trap sometimes catching eels, but also catching mummichogs, I switched to that for smaller baitfish. I went through about three per year due to rusting, and eventually stopped using them, although rusting wouldn’t be a problem in freshwater. Larger fish species, including the biggest minnows, don’t enter these smallish traps much. These caught minnows - killifish or mummichogs - pretty well, whether baited or unbaited. I started catching baitfish using a standard wire funnel trap, the kind sold as a minnow trap that has a small conical entrance at either end and which has matching halves that clip together. The eel trap is nylon-coated and rectangular, measuring 24 x 10 x 10” with a single, circular entrance at the non-lid end. I started out setting an eel trap in order to catch eels. So, for a decade since I moved from the mountains to coastal Virginia, I set a baitfish trap out from spring through late fall. While I primarily use lures to cast while inshore fishing for striped bass, redfish, spotted seatrout, bluefish, and other species, I’ve especially found success using live bait under a popping cork to catch redfish and seatrout. It’s an excellent, symbiotic use and reuse of resources, and it starts with the trap(s). ![]() Living in a coastal area on a tidal creek, I especially appreciate the ability to deploy a baitfish trap to catch live bait, use that bait to catch assorted species of fish, then recycle the carcasses of those fish to catch more bait and/or to catch blue crabs, which I then eat or also use to catch still more bait or gamefish.
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