So I was getting ready to go to Pool 4 with a couple of crayfish traps to see if I could get a few to use for drum bait. I decided I needed to bone up on the regs so I searched for "crayfish" in the 2010 regulations and found this on page 15:

QUOTE:
It is unlawful to:

• Yada yada


• harvest bait (minnows, frogs, crayfish or other wild animals) from infested waters (pages 16 & 17).
  Exception: Harvest for personal use is permitted in waters infested SOLELY with Eurasian watermilfoil. Harvested bait must ONLY be used in the water from which it is harvested. Bait may only be harvested using a cylindrical minnow trap not exceeding 16 inches in diameter and 32 inches in length.

Since the Miss is included in the infested water list, it looks like my plan is out the window. And elsewhere in the regs - crayfish can only be used as bait in the water where they were captured. So putting these two together, this means it is illegal to use crayfish as bait in ANY infested water in Minnesota. No crayfish can legally be used as bait in the Mississippi, St. Croix, Zumbro, or any other water listed on pp 16-17 of the 2010 regs (sans milfoil-only exclusion).

And its not just crayfish. I can't take any critters for bait in any of these waters, even if my intent is to use them right where I catch them. Minnows, gizzard shad, whatever...

Taken literally, if you fish any of Minnesota's infested waters, basically you cannot trap, angle, or seine your own bait from these waters, even if you intend to only use them in the same water as taken from. I had mistakenly assumed it was legal to harvest and use bait from infested waters as long as they were used in the same place. I guess I had that wrong.

Am I interpreting the regs correctly? It seems pretty straight up in the text. Somebody please tell me its not so... We're catching up with Wisconsin, where they'll be dragging JKnuth off to jail for kick netting minnows in a creek.

fiddleFish wrote:
[quote]

QUOTE:
It is unlawful to:
[ul]

Yada yada

[li]harvest bait (minnows, frogs, crayfish or other wild animals) from infested waters (pages 16 & 17).

#1.)Exception: Harvest for personal use is permitted in waters infested SOLELY with Eurasian watermilfoil.

#2.)Harvested bait must ONLY be used in the water from which it is harvested.

#3.)Bait may only be harvested using a cylindrical minnow trap not exceeding 16 inches in diameter and 32 inches in length.

#1 sentence doesn't make any sense. You can only use bait from waters infested with Milfoil and only Milfoil????? Is there a lake in the state that only has Milfoil and no other plants??? Are you sure thats verbatum? All the tackle shops on the arrowhead net Ciscos to use as deadbaits for winter Pike and their lakes arn't infested.....doesn't add up.

#2 sentence means your golden. Trap some Crays out of the Mississippi and go fishing with them ON the Mississippi. You should be good to go Fiddle??

#3 sentence is dumb. I have a kick a$$ square minnow trap and according to this I'm not allowed to use it because its square and not "cylindrical"??????

Minnesota is the most non-free state in the United States. Our hunting, fishing, and driving laws are way out of whack compared to the rest of the country.

"Minnesota is the most non-free state in the United States. Our hunting, fishing, and driving laws are way out of whack compared to the rest of the country."

PA and CA are worse, actually. In a number of CA waters, the only live bait allowed is worms. Others allow only store-bought lures.

The key word in sentence #1 is "infested". This would not include native plants, but refers to exotic invasives. Essentially what this means is that if a body of water is listed by the DNR as being infested with any exotic invasives (e.g. zebra mussels, etc.) other than or in addition to milfoil, then you can't harvest bait there.

You have to take sentence #2 in context. It does not undo the previous sentence, but rather is included in the "Exception: ..." section. I'm not saying I agree with the rule, at all. I think you should be able to use bait in the same spot you collected it...I mean, why not? Just trying to clarify, hope it helps!

I am glad I don't live in Minnesota. We can catch and use crayfish for bait in WI but I believe the Mississippi is the only water you can legally do this in. We bought a crayfish trap earlier in the summer but haven't had it work yet so we resorted to old school tactics with a scoop.

Fiddlefish,

My cousin and I went out with similar plans. We have a local roughfish tournament next weekend and a pair of guys have won it in the past with a lot of big drum caught on crayfish. So we went to some tributaries yesterday and today and scooped crayfish with an old "crawdad scoop" my uncle made. We caught 13 crayfish yesterday and 25 today from a better trib. We tried them tonight and got no bites on them while poles with nightcrawlers in the same spot landed 12" drum after 12" drum. I was in a spot that I know holds big drum too.

Here's today's catch of bait. It was more fun catching the crayfish than the drum today. I'll send pics of us harvesting crayfish next week.



and the entire harvest after using 5 of them.