Thanks, CJB!
But, the ones we think are Arkansas shiners (cause that's what the guy in the bait shop and his supplier call them) are silver in color with a little bit of greenish tint on the top. I'm not sure if they are really Arkansas shiners but they look like the same fish when I look them up on the web.
The golden shiners are gold in color according to all the pictures I've seen so, I'm pretty sure that they aren't the same.
Everything we've seen come out of the fish's bellies have been either silver or they are sorta white like they've been partially digested.
I have a minnow trap but it's not a very good one and it really hasn't been working very well. We haven't caught anything in it after several tries and several different kinds of bait - bread, crackers, and cotton seed meal. Maybe I need a better trap.
Golden shiners only turn golden when they are adult and spawning... Most other times of the year they are a silver color. Adults in spawning color turn golden with yellowish orange fins, rarely a slight red to them.
Here's an adult in non spawning colors:
If you catch a shiner over 6", its almost a guarantee its a golden shiner. As far as regional differences in bait fish go, if it's hatchery raised its gonna be a golden shiner or fathead minnow. Almost no other species is sold as bait fish which is hatchery raised. Other species are sometimes caught from the wild, such as spottail shiners and emerald shiners, but they do not seem to spawn in small ponds which are most commonly used in the hatchery business.
Some hatcheries put catching names on their fish, such as Arkansas shiner but I am betting its just your plain ole golden shiner.
