& Catching & Keeping Live Baits Introducing Part One of a special four part series all about live baits - finding, catching and storing them (either naturally or with the latest power infusion pumps) in this very special series by top scientist, and author, Scott Bannerot. Report, Pics & illustrations by Scott Bannerot I’d like to take this visited, and learned so much opportunity to briefly from each other, that we got introduce myself, and offer together with Peter Webster F&B readers an explanation and decided it’d be a shame to for why in the heck some Yank keep all of the exchange to is writing for their topnotch ourselves. Wendy and I had magazine. In short, it’s all already published a fairly Damon Olsen’s fault. Here’s extensive summary of all the what happened. Some 20 things we’d learned, from all years ago I ended up with a kinds of fishermen scattered doctorate in analysis across the world, The from the University of Miami, Cruiser’s Handbook of then, having worked in Fishing (418 pages, copyright fisheries for nearly ten years 2000 & 2004 by International while operating charter Marine, a division of fishing boats part-time, McGraw-Hill Companies). By switched over to full-time using that as a foundation, captaining in the Florida and adding in all of the Keys for another five years. current nuances and By that time I’d refitted a 41- technology from Down Under foot aluminium sloop, fully and the extremely competitive outfitted for offshore and Florida/Bahamas fishing inshore fishing expeditions, industry, we hope to produce a and my wife Wendy and I set set of cutting-edge articles off in 1995 to , dive, and designed to boost everyone’s sail our way around the fishing success and fun out on world. We washed up in the water. We have learned a Queensland some eight years great deal from Australian later after extensive fishermen, and we are wandering and soon met extremely interested in Damon, who invited me along combining these ideas with to document some of his those from across the world. activities with Nomad Please don’t hesitate to join in Sportfishing. We had so much with your own thoughts and fun comparing tricks and contributions—we know we’ll techniques between Australia learn a tremendous amount and the southeastern U.S.A., from you, and we hope these and all the other places in the articles will provide a creative Caribbean, Central America, springboard for us all. and tropical Pacific we’d F&B

48 Fisherman & Boatowner Copyright SEA Media Pty Ltd (F&B#110 - 6/2005) from www.seamedia.com.au all, what’s the use of having a killer them. Let’s begin with the first part, First, Catch The live well the size of a Jacuzzi if you expertise in marine biology. can’t catch the bait? Consider the vast array of prey items Live Bait! Here in Islamorada, Florida Keys the on the menu of the hundreds of marine charter fishing business is booming, game fish species. Depending on those Part 1/4 and for much of the year success with you wish to target, the appropriate the prime target species depends subset of this array might include slow- Fishing live baits with the right heavily on the success of catching live moving invertebrates like yabbies that tackle and technique out- bait. It’s the same story for many other reside in sandy intertidal zone burrows fisheries around the world, whether it’s in eastern Australia, mole crabs (or produces most other strategies Aussies catching yakkas for bait and “sand fleas”) that bury up to the —but first you’ve got to catch switch billfishing or a Tongan antennae in the eastern U.S. surf zones, them. charterboat catching otule (bigeye marine segmented worms (polychaetes) scad) for a pre-dawn go at dogtooth and assorted mollusks like clams, he first four articles in the series tuna. The expertise applied to the early scallops, top snails, and conch that live Ttake a comprehensive look at morning bait quest largely determines on or in the sediments or rocks. Some catching and maintaining live bait, the quality of the fishing day, which more mobile invertebrates like crabs, probably the largest single barrier means that the top captains are crayfish, prawns or shrimp, or even between the average angler and invariably the top bait catchers. What squid, can be deadly tossed in the path those who have attained does it take to get good at this process? professional-grade levels of success. Author throwing a 3 m (radius) net A very high percentage of the The Biology of Bait just inshore of Crocker Reef, Florida questions I get at seminars are about A good fisherman is a good Keys. This is the smallest net how to break down this wall and get biologist. Knowing where, when, and professional guides might use in an to the other side. under what conditions a specific area like this, where we are typically We’ll begin by taking a thorough species will be present is over half the targeting ballyhoo (garfish), cigar look at worldwide methods for battle. The other half is possessing the minnows, or pilchards. Photo by collecting all kinds of live bait…after technology to catch them once you find Wendy S. Bannerot.

Copyright SEA Media Pty Ltd (F&B#110 - 6/2005) from www.seamedia.com.au Fisherman & Boatowner 49 of marauding predator fish. Mention the words “live bait” and many anglers would first think of silvery, flashing baitfish, any one of countless varieties with representatives worldwide: silversides, anchovies, herring, pilchards, jack mackerels (these include yakkas and yellowtails), mackerel scad, cigar minnows, goggle- eyes (also called bigeye scad), menhaden, assorted small mackerel species (slimy mackerel, Atlantic mackerel), jacks, and trevallys. Folks fond of sailfish, mahi mahi, and tuna might picture garfish, ballyhoo, or flyingfish. Reef fishermen would conjure a variety of bottom species - sweetlips or grunts, emperors, porgies, sea bream, pinfish, mojarras, porgies, small snappers - that big cobia, amberjacks, grouper, coral trout, and snappers love to eat. Live mullet appeal to almost any piscivorous predator. Big game bluewater specialists will imagine that Above: Capt. Skip Nielsen throwing a for many of us are target species - like 3.66 m (radius) net for ballyhoo school-sized skipjack and yellowfin (garfish) on a patch reef offshore of tuna, striped bonito, and mackerel tuna. Islamorada, Florida Keys. This is the I had a shark specialist on my boat the standard size used in this area. other day, and our bait was a whole Left: Emptying ballyhoo (garfish) into live 25 kg amberjack. the live well after his successful cast net throw. Assorted Bait-Catching Equipment inshore squid species that live in The vast variety of live bait shallow grass, sand, or mud-bottomed organisms we have just touched on bays. A simple PVC-frame tow net, makes it obvious that the diversity of deployed from a boat or from a bridge capture methods is nearly as great. Tell spanning an inlet, is effective for you what, let’s first review the catching live shrimp and prawns when spectrum of equipment, and then we’ll they are running at night. move on to some very specific tricks The same long-handled dip net used and techniques for catching bait with for squid also works for flyingfish that selected gear. One of the most amazing meander in to the halo of the night aspects of our travels has been the light. Micronesians use a modified dip sheer number of different ways humans net and strong spotlight to catch flyers catch fish for bait and for food. at night, racing through areas where Simple techniques and equipment they’re common, startling them in to succeed for the slow-moving and flight, and then scooping them in burrowing invertebrates: hand capture, midair just like kids netting butterflies. yabbie pumps, clam rakes, hand I know some of you think I’m pulling shovels. Pursuit of the faster-moving your dorsal fins, but it’s true. If you invertebrates can be a little more think that’s weird, people in the exciting and innovative, for example southeastern Caribbean islands actually ingenious traps of many forms and catch live flyingfish with scoop and designs for crabs, crayfish, shrimp and gill nets after they berley and attract prawns, and even octopuses. Perhaps them to the boat with a longline of the most interesting invertebrate live sugar-cane bundle FADs (I’ll have an bait capture technique is catching live entire article on this later). Flyers, like squid using either a special jig on garfish or ballyhoo, and many other spinning gear, or a long handled dip species, will also take a small baited net, after night-lighting them to the hair hook on light line. vicinity of the boat. Small otter trawls Hook and line is also the general can also be effective for capturing category for the capture of many other

50 Fisherman & Boatowner Copyright SEA Media Pty Ltd (F&B#110 - 6/2005) from www.seamedia.com.au bait species. Recent years have seen an know how some of these old sea dogs chum (berley) around the area to round immense expansion in the design and can be - so I’ll call my friend “Carl”). up the bait. The next trick is to have a marketing of rigs, multiple-hook The hoop itself can be stainless steel or bucket of mixed berley and sand, with quills attractive to most planktivores, aluminium rod of approximately 13 the texture just sticky enough to adhere usually weighted, dropped deep, and mm diameter, formed in a perfect together in a nicely packed, cricket-ball then jigged in short twitches - circle of diameter 1.2 to 1.8 m. Carl size. Come tight on the hook, throw pilchards, goggle-eyes, yakkas, more often uses catfish trap rings that some loose handfuls of sand/berley yellowtails, you name it, they all fall he orders in from Louisiana. These are mix to cloud the water and drive the for these things like kindergartners for an opaque, resin-like material, and mackerel scad crazy. Now gently lollies. Larger offerings - bucktail jigs, they’re extremely durable. deploy the hoop net down a good 5 m small soft plastics, octopus skirts, He constructs a fairly fat, cone- or more. Shake the chum bag, and toss feathers, small metal jigs and shaped “bag” of monofilament netting a tight pattern of three or four sand spoons - are the go for the mackerels to the hoop, mesh size 25 mm to 38 balls up-current of the expected and tunas coveted by those seeking mm (1 to 1.5 inch) stretch. He secures upward trajectory of the bag, followed bigger game. a 4 to 8 ounce (.11 to .23 kg) egg by another loose handful. The trick is sinker to the apex of the bag or cone, to pull that submerged hoop net up Hoop Nets forms a heavy monofilament bridle hard just as the school of mackerel If we were to hold a contest for the terminating in a large barrel swivel, to scad comes swarming up into the cloud most popular baitfish in the world, at which he splices 15 m or so of 10mm of sand balls. Their vision is impaired least in the tropics and subtropics, the three-strand nylon retrieve line to by the turbidity, and they are feeding winner might well be the mackerel finish the product. voraciously on the bits of chum. When scad. Take a look at the photo on page Once the captain has this contraption they eventually sense danger, they 305 in the 9th edition of Grant’s Guide on board, he heads for the outer reef sound right in to the net as it sweeps to by Ern Grant—Yanks and drop-off to one of the spots known for up to greet them. Aussies actually call this fish the same mackerel scad. The schools tend to I’ll pass along two last observations name, although locally in the Florida hover over heavy coral in 10 to 15 m since I know there’ll likely be some Keys fishermen refer to them as depth near the reef crest, particularly if innovative readers constructing hoop speedos. These fast, silvery, highly a sharp-dropping wall to 30 m or more nets after reading this. First, I’m active baitfish are normally 250 to 450 lies just offshore. These fish also like mm (10 to 18 inches) in length. They to hang around floating reef markers, Below: Here’s one of the top charter occur on outer reef slopes, usually in the ideal description being large steel boats of Islamorada, Florida Keys, the 10 to 15 m depth or more, and nun buoys moored in their favorite Yabba Dabba Doo! anchored and all although they can be caught depth. That said, mackerel scad can be set up to begin hoop netting mackerel and by using a few tricks in caught considerably deeper, for scad. Deckie Justin Baker (left) has a conjunction with very large cast nets example in at least 35 m depth on the handful of sand/berley mix ready to (4.27 m or 14 foot radius minimum), outside of steep reef walls. If they’re toss in to the water. The berley bag is Keys charter captains out-catch all really thick you might catch them on suspended from the starboard other methods for this species using a the drift, but it’s far more common to transom cleat. Capt. Steve Leopold is hoop net. Three dozen or more of these anchor, after dragging a suspended just lowering the hoop net in to the in the live well guarantee anglers the mesh bag with a fresh block of frozen berley slick. best possible shot at everything from wahoo, billfish, tuna, and large mackerel to big bottom fish. Here’s how it works. Like most baitfish, mackerel scad are extremely sensitive to any object flying through the air above them, or any lateral movement in the water around them. Their first reaction is to “hit the deck” en masse—sounding rapidly to the bottom, essentially reducing vulnerability by transforming their environment from three to two dimensions. The hoop net takes advantage of this tendency by deploying deep, and then retrieving upward - the reverse of a cast net. The only place I’ve seen hoop nets like this is aboard offshore charter boats in the Islamorada, Florida Keys area, virtually all constructed by the same veteran net maker (for reasons unknown he refuses to be named - you

Copyright SEA Media Pty Ltd (F&B#110 - 6/2005) from www.seamedia.com.au Fisherman & Boatowner 51 Left: Justin has thrown virtually certain that using a clear a pattern of four cricket acrylic hoop instead of an opaque ball-sized sand/berley material, similar to that used for the balls into the slick, rims of professional-grade, Steve has waited for the monofilament-mesh tropical fish mackerel scad to collecting nets, would be far more swarm vertically up into effective. Carl agrees and has the cloud of sand and experimented with the idea, but he berley, and has now says this material tends to shatter started to pull the hoop easily if it smacks the side of the boat net up to greet the or gets other rough treatment, and he school as hard and fast hasn’t yet found any transparent as possible. Justin is material that can take the punishment. just about to stomp Second, fixed-hoop renditions of this loudly on the deck to net are bulky and take up a lot of spook the fish down in room. A hoop that breaks down easily to the ascending net. for storage would be immensely valuable, particularly on small open fishing boats where space is at a premium. Left: Success! That’s a We need some Aussie ingenuity here nice load of mackerel to help us out, and I might add that no scad Steve is swinging one is producing a commercial version aboard the Yabba of this net despite considerable Dabba Doo! demand. Note that hoop nets work well for at least several other fast- diving bait species that respond to berley. Cast Nets Hoop nets, even where they’re popular, represent a specialty bait- catching device used probably no more that 20 to 30 percent of the total bait-catching time. Gill nets—straight monofilament-mesh fences with a float line on top and lead line on the bottom—are in general fundamentally flawed with regard to the capture of live bait because they regularly entangle and damage the fish they catch. Seine nets, including purse seines, are highly effective but seldom practical for a sport fishing operation attempting to quickly fill a live well with bait en route to the grounds with Below Left: Here’s a the minimum possible gear. Few types close look at the Florida of equipment can rival the compact version of a mackerel storage and high efficiency of large (3 scad. Compare this to to 5.5 m radius), professional-class the photo of the eastern monofilament cast nets, hence their Australian mackerel widespread popularity around the scad on page 305 of the world for catching all manner of fish 9th edition of Grant’s and invertebrates for food and for bait. Guide to Fishes. As We spend from page 189 to page you will see, they’re 200 of The Cruiser’s Handbook of essentially identical. Fishing, including 25 photographs, Mackerel scad occur describing every detail of how to worldwide in the throw a large pro cast net “Keys subtropics and tropics, style”. This method results in the and are deeply revered longest distance and best spread of any as baitfish throughout I’ve witnessed, possibly because the their range. livelihood of the fishermen who

52 Fisherman & Boatowner Copyright SEA Media Pty Ltd (F&B#110 - 6/2005) from www.seamedia.com.au developed it absolutely depends on these places. maximum performance in this particular Once located, think about the most part of the world. We’ll of course need efficient way to catch them. Should you to fast forward for the purpose of this drift, power-drift, anchor, push-pole, or article through all of the net-throwing use an electric motor? Are you spooking details, and, mind you, I have seen many them with engine noise? Aussies proficiently throwing their cast Try never to get between the sun and nets so it’s not like many of you need a your quarry. Shadows cast by you or the new method right away. Instead, we’ll boat, especially superstructure or masts, focus on some deadly techniques for and certainly by the airborne net, make catching bait with cast nets, assuming fish nervous and give early warning at that you own one and are getting it to the time of the net throw. If you are open well. The only proviso is that most anchored and the lie of the vessel of the nets I’ve casually observed at created by wind and current casts least in Queensland are less than half the shadows over the berley slick, consider size of what the professionals use in some combination of an anchor bridle Florida, and the majority of the bait and altered berley-bag placement to these Keys fishermen exploit using the eliminate the problem. One possibility is techniques we’ll describe would be very to suspend the bag laterally with the aid difficult to catch, most of the time, with Much of what we are going to enjoy of an outrigger. cast nets smaller than 3.65 m radius. (and learn) from Scott in this unique Adjust your berley bag when the fishing series over the next 12 current runs into the prevailing wind. General Principles months emanates from Scott’s book, Most of the times when you anchor and Feeding behavior dictates strategies The Cruiser’s Handbook Of Fishing. deploy a berley bag to attract bait, the for cast netting assorted baitfish species. Published by McGraw-Hill in the U.S., slick flows cooperatively away from the Those that respond well to berley slicks it is available here from Boat Books transom. Baitfish approach from and tend to stick near the surface, like branches and good bookshops downwind, allowing you to throw the garfish and under some conditions everywhere. It is one of the most cast net off the wind. Conversely, if the sardines, sprat, herring, pilchards, and interesting fishing books I’ve ever current is in to the wind, positioning the the like, might succumb to simple read - and highly recommended. baitfish in the slick for a downwind net berleying and netting as they swim up throw requires re-positioning the berley close enough to the boat. Others, like bag out away from the transom cigar minnows and yakkas, almost Read the signs. Wind velocity, wind (throwing a cast net in to the wind is always require mixed sand and berley direction, moon phase, tidal stage and worse than the proverbial urination balls in addition to the standard berley flow, air and water temperature, time of equivalent). We usually fly a fishing kite slick - the standard sequence being to year, time of day, bird presence and out from the transom, tighten the release shake the bag, fire out loose handfuls of behavior, water clarity, degree of cloud clip, and suspend the berley bag sand/berley mix to cloud the water, then cover, recent weather events, barometric vertically from the kite-line clip at an toss a pattern of three to six cricket-sized pressure, current weather pattern, wave appropriate distance (much more on kite sand/berley balls into the cloud, and action, phytoplankton blooms, predator fishing later in the series). throw the net with crown centered on fish location and abundance, and many I’ll leave you with two last tricks. the murky region of water. Now toss a other variables influence the behavior First, if you’re cast netting garfish or couple of sand/berley balls on top of the and position of baitfish at any given hoop netting mackerel scad, stomp on descending net. The fast-swimming time. The more you understand every the deck loudly just as the cast net hits baitfish spook entirely out from under small detail of the biology and ecology the water or just as the hoop net is the net when it hits the water, but their of the bait you seek, the more successful pulling sharply upwards. Garfish will downfall is that they quickly re-group, and consistent will be your efforts to jump up in alarm, mackerel scad will then swim back under the net and find them. sound down in alarm, in both cases attempt to rise up in to the sand and Use your electronics. Switch your resulting in much higher catches when berley cloud that is falling below, and depth-finder to high frequency (usually timed properly. Second, if you’re just above, the large descending 200 kHz) for detailed views of shallower anchored at night, and baitfish have parachute of monofilament. Of course waters. Learn to identify fish by species begun to swarm around the boat eating other species, for example most of the according to what you see on the screen. the plankton and other organisms mullets, don’t respond to berley at all Search habitats like channels, banks, and attracted to the light, and you are getting and must be stalked and cast netted as sharp breaks in the bottom that project ready to cast net them, have your fishing they swim near the surface in schools. plankton and other food items to baitfish partner flick off the light just before the This strategy works for a number of schools in a turbulent flow. Pay net leaves your hands. This literally puts other schooling bait species, particularly particular attention to abrupt, steep the fish in the dark, they can’t see the when they are flipping at the surface on gradients in an otherwise featureless silhouette of the net coming, and you’ll very calm mornings. seafloor. Check out known focal points catch many times more than if you’d left Regardless of bait target species, here for baitfish presence, like shark nets off the light on. are a few tips to stick under your cap for Queensland beaches, and maintain a the next outing: meticulous GPS waypoint library of F&B

Copyright SEA Media Pty Ltd (F&B#110 - 6/2005) from www.seamedia.com.au Fisherman & Boatowner 53