Catching wild shiners

Nsmith2015

I just moved to Ocala from Michigan and I would like to use wild shiners for bass fishing. Where do I start to look to find and catch a good number of shiners in the Ocala area? 

RevJoeyFitz

My fav place is the bait shop 😆 

call ahead and check. If not, blue gills work great too

capt louie

If you find them , ones caught on a hook work best if using that day.  PM sent

surfman

I don't think it is legal to use blue gills but, if you feel it is worth the risk go for it, I usually just find a deeper area and just start chumming with bread. You will get bream coming in too but if the shiners are there they will show up too and I catch them on small hooks and dough balls. You can cast net them but you can only keep shiners if netted, anything else is not allowed, except tilapia.

capt louie

Bluegill are allowed as bait only if hook and line caught not netted.

tankered

^^^Typical ridiculous, almost 100% unenforceable rule. Much like circle hooks but even dumber.

Who comes up with this crap??

Missed

I used to do the bread thing.  Couple pieces of bread - tear into small pieces and toss in - watch em and see if the minnows start tearing em up.  Then use a bread ball on a small hook.  I used to use a 12 or 14 fly hook.  Most of the minnows were in the 4-6 inch bracket.  A seine would have caught too many and a cast net woulda made it easier.

If netting, make sure the water is shallow enough.

These days I'd just buy em at $1 per and save my time for fishing.

Turner River Terror

Fun Fact....
When you have the Shiners chummed up and throw the castnet..Hook a fresh one on your rod and toss it where you just caught the Shiners.
I use to dive and watch what was going on and it never failed when the Shiners got thick and that Castnet hit the water every Bass in the area would head over to see what was going on.
Caught some real nice Bass just throwing one back out.

Sixth Generation

TRT you are once again correct.  The biggest bass I the lake know where the school of shiners are and get fired up when they go to feeding.  Watched many get eaten under the docks in Orlando when I was a kid.  Mask and snorkel as well.  

Sixth Generation

In