Shiners at home

[NJSquatch]

How do folks keep leftover shiners alive at home?

I have them in a five gallon bucket with an aquarium stone running, change the water every couple of days and treat the tap water with conditioner but start to experience die off after 5-10 days. Curious as to what others do

Thanks in advanced

[Jigman13]

Water change, aerator, and filtration should suffice. Get some finer shiner too. A little of the blue crack goes a long way...as does shiner start to hard scales and enhance slime coat.

[ScowardNJ]

I use a cheap whisper filter

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0002DHYF4/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1483202868&sr=8-3&keywords=whisper+filter

in a 10 gallon water cooler that I found on Craigslist. Keep it in a cool place.
I'll do 1/3 water change once in while. I've kept shiners over a month this way.

[acabtp]

I use a cheap whisper filter

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0002DHYF4/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1483202868&sr=8-3&keywords=whisper+filter

in a 10 gallon water cooler that I found on Craigslist. Keep it in a cool place.
I'll do 1/3 water change once in while. I've kept shiners over a month this way.

^ me too

[Charlie B]

When I built the live well in my boat I went to talk to laurie at Dows about how to treat the water. She uses well water and salt as in kosher salt or water softener salt. In my case I have a 10 gallon round insulated water cooler for my livewell. I change out about 1/4 to 1/3 of the water every day with lake water and add about 1/2 cup of kosher salt and keep an airstone running constantly. I have kept left over herring alive for over a week and a half and I don't know how long they could have lasted if I didn't use them up. And I believe herring are tougher to keep alive than shiners...Charlie

[pacrags]

I think i now have another project for the winter - digging out one of my old aquariums to set up to keep bait

[Chrisper4694]

18 gallon rubbermaid bin aquarium filter and bubbler in cold garage. some of that bacteria aquarium starter seemed to help too. and i swap out about 5 gallons every couple of days. i think my chubs or the other shiners have been murdering each other though, every 1-2 days there is one lone shiner with his head eaten off floating hahahaha

[Jigman13]

18 gallon rubbermaid bin aquarium filter and bubbler in cold garage. some of that bacteria aquarium starter seemed to help too. and i swap out about 5 gallons every couple of days. i think my chubs or the other shiners have been murdering each other though, every 1-2 days there is one lone shiner with his head eaten off floating hahahaha

That's awesome

[Eskimo]

.

A home bait well is always a challenge, but it's great to always have some live bait on hand. It also allows you to keep fish the bait stores don't carry.

The challenge is keeping the fish from poisoning themselves on their own waste. Fish pee ammonia (NH3 and NH4+) which is very toxic to the fish. This isn't a big deal in a lake, but a dozen shiners in a 5 gallon bucket will eventually render their environment uninhabitable and die.

In an established fish tank with a constant population of fish, the aquarium and filter is populated with nitrifying bacteria that oxidize the toxic ammonia to nitrate (NO3-) which is basically non-toxic. These bacteria need a few weeks to reach a population that "eats" the ammonia as fast as the fish produce it. The bacteria reproduce slowly because that ammonia oxidation process doesn't yield a lot of energy for them to live off.

In a home bait well where the number of fish is always changing there is a lag between the time a load of fish is dropped into the tank and the time the bacteria can catch up and start consuming the waste fast enough to keep the fish alive.

Doing constant partial water changes will go a long towards keeping your bait fish alive. Also, remove dead and sick fish as soon as possible. A rotting carcass releases a tremendous amount of ammonia as the proteins in the fish break down.

There are a lot of other issues you'll run into like some fish don't like being in an aquarium and don't live long in there like herring. Some times the fish you buy are already sick and/or poisoned on their own waste. I've had that problem with fathead minnows I bought at a pet store.

Right now, I only have one 29-gallon aquarium (home bait tank) running which is almost empty. I just have some baby bullhead catfish in it to maintain a population of nitrifying bacteria. I'll start re-stocking it in the spring.

.

[Delawareriver]

Excellent information Eskimo. I've kept aquariums for years with some high dollar hard to keep fish and the information you gave is spot on!

[NJSquatch]

Thanks guys for the recommendations and biology lesson.

I think my main problem was that I was doing a full water change every couple of days and removing any of the beneficial bacteria. I bought an el cheapo filter and will only do partial water changeouts going forward.

[briansnat]

In the winter I kept my unused shiners in the cold basement in the bait bucket using a cheap aquarium aerator. As long as I changed the water every couple of days they would stay alive. I could keep them alive up to two weeks as long as I regularly changed the water.

If you are going beyond 2 weeks I suspect you will need a more sophisticated system.

[SaltLife1980]

I went to petsmart and got a cheap tank { forget the size } then the air stone and filter unit. Change water like every 3 days. They dont all survive but more alive then dead.