I have been on a mission to try to obtain threadfin shad for my 80 acre lake in California for the last year. We lost our shad population a few years ago and the bass fishery changed and suffered as a result. I love shad I think even more than the bass do..lol.. I find a lake is much easier to fish when shad are present as the bass are easier to locate, roam more in packs making multiple catches easy, and plus allow anglers to catch fish with more lures and presentations. Besides this, the overall weight of the bass in all size classes have much higher RWs.
I have found a fish producer approx. 3 1/2 hours from me who says he can supply me shad IF I buy bluegill, so he can make one haul to me. He is leery on whether or not his plan of transporting 200 lbs. of adult (3 - 5") shad will make it or not to my lake, so he wants me to buy bluegill.
I would like to know if there any trick to successfully hauling shad? I have read in a SRAC document that adding 4 lbs. of non-iodized salt plus 8 grams of MS-22 per 100 gallons of hauling water, oxygen at 7 - 8 ppm, and reducing hauling tank temperature with ice will work.
Is this all there is to it? I want to let the guy know to increase the odds the shad will make it as they are what I really want..not the bluegill. Any help would be GREATLY APPRECIATED for those who have hauled and or raised shad please.
My lake temperature is now 60 degrees in the AM and heats to 65 degrees in the afternoon. The lake is extremely fertile and has depths to 65'. I would like to get the shad soon so I can get a spawn off of them as soon as the water maintains 65 degrees (should happen in the next week or two).
On a side note, in the same SRAC article (s) there is a comment that threadfin shad have been successfully introduced into a lake by transferring the egg-laden spawning material directly to the stocking lake. Has any fish producer here done this? If so what material would you use to hold the eggs? I was thinking of trying air condition screens in a roll form. What I would do is go to a lake down the road that is loaded with shad and set out the spawn screens to have them floating vertically in 3' - 5' of water (float on top and leaded at the bottom). Then I could check them a few times a week and once I see the bubble eggs on the screen, roll the screen up in to small sections, drop them in 30 gallon trash cans filled with lake water and then place the screens in my lake. Would this work??
Thanks guys!!!
Dave
