Frogs

[DTro]

As I was sitting in the boat bee ess’ing with PapaGrump last night he says, “hey check it out”. He then points out a small frog across the river trying to get up a steep cut bank.

A little bit later, I look over on the other side in the shallows and see a frog emerge on the surface…….then another…..then another.

I’m not saying…..I’m just saying

[pureinsanity]

Frogs are working right now. As are toads. I am having trouble finding the big guys though.

[wooduck26]

Frogs IMO are the best catfish bait you can use.....if you can find them.

[tweedlap]

Pure,

You use toads?

I know Backwater Eddie says salamander are very good, too.

tweed

[MinnesnowtaWild]

I like Salamanders waaay too much to use them for bait (I am a reptile keeper)...but Frogs I may have to try out.

[kittycatcher16]

I know frogs work great! I had about 2 dozen or so big leopard frogs about a month ago. I got a good lake to catch them but no time to fish. I did manage to use them all up. They work like a charm! Never fished for flats with them but always catch channels when I go.

[HotPocket]

Frogs

[pureinsanity]

yes, I caught a nice channel on a toad the other night.

[Here-Kitty-Kitty]

A very nice channel I might add

[Scott M]

I was checking my good frog spot two weeks ago, and it had nothing compared to last year...Then on Thursday I stumbled upon a new spot. I'm bringing some nets with this week to check it out some more.

[Gordie]

yes frogs are on the move and I picked up a mighty nice channel yesterday with one.

[ec30_06]

I was checking my good frog spot two weeks ago, and it had nothing compared to last year...Then on Thursday I stumbled upon a new spot. I'm bringing some nets with this week to check it out some more.

I think we know a dairy farmer that has a bunch of frogs at his place too

[Ed Carlson]

Frogs start to work well mid summer and rock on well on into fall for cats. Waterdogs will do well as the frogs slow down and the cats switch preferences to fresh cuts once again in the late season cold water period.

WaterDogs are very good about now..( Very Good ).and also do well into fall and late fall. I prefer the Waterdog stage of the Tiger Salamander, and not the Salamander stage, and it appears the cats and walleye do too. This time of year I like the 4-6" Dogs rigged live on slip rigs or on jigs.

[kittycatcher16]

This might be a dumb question...but...What is a waterdog??

[SteveD]

You guys have me all intrigued by this frog stuff. I've never used or caught frogs. Other than running over them on the highway I've never tried to catch frogs. I'm heading for Lockport this weekend so I'm sure I'll get trained in on how to use them. Can somebody kind of school up us rookies on catching and keeping frogs:

#1: Explain how you find them and the best way to catch them. What are you looking for in ponds or places to find them?

#2: When you are catching them what do you put them in? Don't they just jump out of a 5 gallon bucket?

#3: When you have caught a bunch how do you keep them alive or store them? My wife will love me setting up another bait tank of some sort I'm sure.

[Shack]

To be correct KC16, they use Portuguese Water Dog Puppies. They are legal up that way:

The tan ones are working the best I heard over the black ones

aquatic salamanders

Steve, I have found the best thing to do is just give my kids a 5 gal bucket and make it their project for the day. They brought me back a whole bucket full last year. Then I told them to make sure they stay alive outside some where

[DTro]

Steve, I got a good lesson on Frog containment last night. I had a few dozen in a flow troll bucket, and then about 4 dozen in a 5 gallon pail. The pail was covered in netting (secured with a rubber band) and then there was a slot cut in the netting. Obviously the guy that set up the bucket had done this a time or two before.

With the Flow Troll the frogs go in perfect, but coming out…..not so much.

With the pail, I could just reach into the slit and pull them out as needed.

I’ve been keeping them in a that bucket with shallow water and in a cool shaded place, then changing the water after several hours.

I know for a fact there are several here that have many years of froggin under their belt and can help out with much better info, especially locations to find them.

[aanderud]

I've never used frogs for bait, but I'm pretty sure it is as easy as hooking them in the head and throwing them out there.

Catching them was pretty easy.

On land, I just used a regular "bait net" that I use in my baitwell and bait tank when scooping up bullheads. It's the fine mesh, you know maybe 1/4 inch holes or so. It Places we found them that the small net was useful were lowlying land areas near water, but far enough from the water that the frogs couldn't get to the water without at least a few hops.

I also used a larger scoop net, the same one that I use when dip-netting bullheads and whatnot. Again, it has about 1/4 inch mesh. This larger, long-handled net came in handy when walking around the edge of the pond. The frogs were sitting right in the weeds on the pond edge, and when you'd get within 2-3 feet of them they'd jump into the water thinking they were making their escape...instead, they swam right into my net out in front of them.

The pond we got them out of held a surprisingly large population, if you ask me. It had relatively little weed growth around it, compared to something like a giant slough out in the boonies. It was a pond dug out specifically for swimming in a guy's back yard. But, there were frogs there!

I've heard that walking county road ditches can be productive in certain areas too, my buddy Eric got a bucketful doing that last night up near Fargo.

As for keeping them alive, you can put a few dozen of them at a time into a regular old flow-troll minnow bucket (with a spring loaded flap). They really don't need a lot of water, if anything just put a 1/4-1/2 inch in the bottom to keep them moist. Keep them in the shade and they'll keep for quite some time. I don't know about weeks, but I know that they'll be fine in a bucket like that from at least a Thursday to Monday timeframe.

If you keep them a long time you might worry about feeding them. I imagine they might eat crickets or something, but they also might just be too mad about being captive. If I used them a lot, I think I would try keeping my minnow bucket in a fridge. I think at 36 degrees or so their metabolism would slow down quite a bit and one could probably keep them for weeks without feeding them. With some frogs I was dinking with earlier this week, I put them in a cooler of icewater in my trunk while I worked a full day. Got home and my wife said "they're all dead". I said "nah, i think they're just sorta dormant or hibernating because they're so cold". Sure enough, warmed some up and they came right back to life and were hopping around.

Those are my observations after catching them this week and talking with a couple other folks the last few days. I'm definitely no pro, hoping others who have more frog experience will chime in, especially on the storage aspects.

[HossFisher]

I've found that if you dont have a net for some reason and the frogs are on land; a tennis raquet or badminton raquet works really well to catch them without harming them.

[pureinsanity]

I was catching them last night on the river bank. I was just walking a long the bank where there was some tall grass and they were hopping into the river. I just watched them swim out 3 feet and than come right back to shore and hide. easy pickings! I was able to catch them all by hand. However, a net works better!

Look near ponds or around the edges of ponds. However often frogs will be far away from any water... If there is tall grass and water near by you are bound to find some frogs. Specially if its very shady and moist...

I also go out at night and listen for them. Each type of frogs have different calls and you can distinguish if that's the kind you are going for or not. After determining if that the type of frog you want you can just follow the sound and locate the frogs.

[Ed Carlson]

DTRO....I got an easy to make "Backwater Eddy style Frogienda" for ya bud.

1 - 5 Gal pail

1 - 5 Gal pail lid

2 - 6" by 2' slices of a rubber inner tube or slit a bicycle tube down the side and slit that into 2 2' lengths.

I cut a handy sized circle in the lid of the pail plenty wide to reach in and out with ease even for a guy with large hands.

Then overlap the rubber tube sections across the top of the empty pail just so they overlap an inch or so....snap on the lid on one side securing the 2 rubber strips.....now stretch the rubber pieces over the opposite edge and snap on the lid securely all around the pail.

You end up with a overlapping rubber gasket that is easy to reach into and no Kermets get a chance to leap out as you drag the unlucky Kermit out to play.

You can trim the excess rubber after snapping the lid on, or leave a bit of overhang, your call.

NOTE: I found pail lids with a gasket in the lid do best for this...but I remove the gasket as the thin stretched rubber will replace it making a nice tight fit.

Another tip is break out the drill, a 1/4 bit is good. Now drill lots of holes on the top 1/3 of the pail all around the pail, lots of them. This makes draining the smelly Kermit-Pee out easy...freshen them up when needed. Also keeps the pail from overheating in the sun and one can stake out the pails in a marsh and let the bugs creep in and the Kermits will like the meal from time to time.

I do not like letting them sit in water too long either. What I found works well is wet straw in the pail. They like to dig into it during cool nights and they appear to stay healthier.

[pureinsanity]

I have also seen burlap sacks used for frogs. Spray them down with water and the burlap stays damp for some time. I made a pouch out of some old seine net that works pretty good. Keeps them in there and I can easily grab one when needed. It also has the floats so you could tie it up in a pond or in the river to keep them wet from time to time.

[DTro]

DTRO....I got an easy to make "Backwater Eddy style Frogienda" for ya bud.

1 - 5 Gal pail

1 - 5 Gal pail lid

2 - 6" by 2' slices of a rubber innertube or slit a bicycle tube down the side and slit that into 2 2' lengths.

I cut a handy sized circle in the lid of the pail plenty wide to reach in and out with ease even for a guy with large hands.

Then overlap the rubber tube sections across the top of the empty pail just so they overlap an inch or so....snap on the lid on one side securing the 2 rubber strips.....now stretch the rubber pieces over the opposite edge and snap on the lid securely all around the pail.

You end up with a overlapping rubber gasket that is easy to reach into and no Kermets get a chance to leap out as you drag the unlucky Kermit out to play.

You can trim the excess rubber after snaping the lid on, or leave a bit of overhang, you call.

NOTE: I found pail lids with a gasket in the lid do best for this...but I remove the gasket as the thin stretched rubber will replace it making a nice tight fit.

Another tip is break out the drill, 1/4 bit is good. Now drill lots of holes on the top 1/3 of the pail all around the pail. This makes draining the smelly Kermit-Pee out easy...freshen them up when needed. Also keeps the pail from overheating in the sun and one can stake out the pails in a marsh and let the bugs creep in and the Kermits will like the meal from time to time.

I do not like letting them sit in water too long either. What I found works well is wet straw in the pail. They like to dig into it during cool nights and they appear to stay healthier.

Sounds like a fun project and it would be nice to have a dedicated frog bucket. Thanks Ed!

I bet it would be a fun practical joke with a bunch of crayfish.

[pureinsanity]

Remind me to never reach in any of your buckets...

[Blue Kayak]

I really like frogs for channel cats. When I am fishing I keep them in a flow troll plastic bucket with a couple of inches of water in the bottom. Having a couple of inches of water in any bucket greatly limits their jumping ability.

If you have a "bait fridge" you can keep frogs in there for a long time with just weekly changes of the water. Then I have about six inches of water in a bucket. Don't use a Styrofoam bucket. Mine leaked and killed my bait fridge.

I catch frogs with a trout net. I have heard of using a fly and hooking them, but have never tried it.

Steve D. good luck on your Lockport trip. Here is a write up from my trip last year with a couple of tips for finding frogs up there. I don't think you can bring them across the border. You can also catch goldeye below the dam for bait.

http://www.fishingminnesota.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1500300/2

I use frogs like cut bait. I kill them, hook them in the mouth, cut off the back legs, and make shallow cuts in their belly.