Corey Avery

When I was a kid all I can remember is catching non stop sunfish, even when I wasn't fishing for them. Now I feel like I can't catch one if my life depended on it. Does anyone know of a specific pond or lake in Boynton beach or the surrounding areas that is just packed with panfish? Nephew is in town and I have like an hour to take him fishing shortly. I want him to have fun and catch these things like I did when I was little. Any locations, tips, etc would be great! Thanks guys

Thanks for bringing that up Rob. I was pretty confident it was okay that I was using them, but not 100%. You're comment prompted me to look it up. I feel a little more comfortable now, lol. You can see the laws and source link above.

Thanks everyone for the tips. I caught one pretty big blue gill (seemed like a different species.... same shape but almost had stripes on it with a dot near its head?) with a worm and bobber, almost to big to use as bait, and I use really big baits, lol. Anyways though I freelined it for a few minutes and had a massive follower right behind my bait. Basically came right up and gave my bait a kiss, but wouldn't bite. Unfortunately by time I see the bass though they usually see me (no boat so I can only shore fish). I had my little brother down for a vacation and he pulled a 12.4 oz bass out of the same pond. I literally can't stop fishing this pond, just knowing there is at least one 12 lb bass. Its a small pond but I have a strong feeling that 12 lb'r isn't the biggest one in there. Also if anyone knows the laws regarding using blue gills, or the other species in the same family please let me know. I read elsewhere that as long as it is caught on your own line and hook, you can use it. As long as you're not purchasing it or catching them with the intent to sell, I think its okay. Can anyone verify that because I could be totally wrong. EDIT: This is copied from Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commision. Whole pickerel or panfish (e.g., bluegill, redear sunfish, redbreast sunfish, spotted sunfish, flier, warmouth) or parts thereof may be used as bait for sportfishing by the angler who caught them. Whole pickerel or bream or parts thereof may not be used as bait for trotlines or bush hooks or any method other than by rod and reel or pole and line. Panfish less than 4 inches in total length raised by a licensed aquaculture facility may be purchased and used for bait. source - http://myfwc.com/fishing/freshwater/regulations/taking-bait/

Thank you man I appreciate that. Any recommendations on locatiions and methods for catching my own live bait?

East of Congress, west of Lawrence

For me, nothing is catching more bass than live bait - shiners, and even better, live blue gill. I need some help from some people a little more familiar with tthe are than myself, though. Other than the fact that there is a decent sized lake with GIANT bass in it, I don't know of any other good fishing holes, or even tackle shops to find what I'm look for. I'll preface it with this though- Ok, so I have my "secret pond" that I fish in Boynton Beach, Fl. I don't know if it was the weather, possibly pre spawn patterns or have any idea for that matter, but before I left for the holidays (around the 21st).... giant plastic worms were killing it for me. I was throwing worms no smaller than 12 inches and as big as 16 inches. The big guy caught in the pic I attached was caught on a 16 inch black plum worm. When I came back two weeks later (about 8 days ago).... absolutely nothing. I went to every trick in the book that always worked for me (plastic worms, I even dropped down to 6 inches rather than the normal 12-16", and swimbaits were always good too). I couldn't get a bite, and only caught one two pound bass in 4 days of fishing. I'm used to catching at least a couple pounder every twenty minutes or so at this particular location. I've been doing a lot of reading online and I hear a lot of people swear that there is no better bait than a wild golden shiner for south florida bass. It seems that anyone who knows anything about them keeps it a secret because as hard as I've tried... I can't for the life of me find a bait shop that carries them... or even pointed in a possible direction of being able to catch them on my own. Any help in anyway that would lead me in the direction of those little fishies would be great. I'm not a huge fan of the farm raised shiners.... they do work great... but the ones I usually come across are relatively small, not that active, and they die pretty quickly. I've been fishing this pond for about a year now. I've only ever seen one peacock bass (decent one too, took me 45 minutes to get in to bite while it was on its bed) and other than that just Largemouth bass. Yesterday for the first time ever though, I thought I'd try my luck with catching some kind, any kind of small fish that I could try and use as bait. I ended up catching a catfish, but that's irrelavant because I'm not gonna use it as bait and its not what I'm trying to catch. What got me super excited though.... is I caught two little bluegill, or "sunfish" as I knew them growing up in MA. What excited me more, is what I caught using those little guys as live bait. As a kid I hated catching them. I'd literraly be taking one off my line every two seconds whem I'm trying to catch something else, and I don't eat fish so they were really just a pain in the a**. I'll try to attach a pic of one of the little guys below. Bottom line is, when I cast them out I can see action almost instantly, and neither of the bluegills were in the water for more then two minutes before I had a big bass on the line. Here's my dillema.... where I used to be able to catch about 5 bluegill a minute.... it took me foreevvvverrrr to catch two little ones. Now I can't catch one at all. I'm getting the feeling there's barely any bluegill in the pond. And I don't wanna fish five hours just to catch bait that can be used once. Does anyone have any good recommendations of somewhere nearby (from lakeworth to delray) that has great pan fishing? Or better yet anywhere that I can go and catch a decent amount of live bait without using up the entire day? Any and all information would help. Sorry about the long post... I'm new to the forum so I apologize in advance if there were any guidelines I didn't follow properly. it just seems like everyone that I talk to for fishing advice down here, even the bait shop owners, won't give much information. Any ways though, to make up for the bad post I'll leave you with a few pics of some of the nice bass I've been pulling outta here.