Crawfish/Minnow Traps

Both craw fish and minnows are commonly used as bait for gamefish such as bass. Craw fish are also very tasty if you can catch enough. This is a trap that my cousin and I use to catch a craw fish dinner in michigan. For those that dont know, michigan isnt exactly known for their crawfish, but we set alot of them and manage to catch quite a few in the summer.
You will need:
- a two liter
- a knife
- sissors
- a stapler
- string
- a drill ( or something to make small holes
- dog food or scraps of fish (for bait)

Step 1: Cut Top

Cut a horazontal slit in the bottle with a knife then use sissors to cut along side the label. Next cut the label off.

Step 2: Putting It Together.

Simply turn the piece you cut off over so the neck is in the bottle and staple it shut at the top.

Step 3: Details

Some final details are putting small holes in the bottom to help it sink and a string that will allow you to tie it off to shore. Rocks in the bottom to help it sink isnt a bad idea either.

Step 4: Setting It Up

Find a creek or river where you see craw fish and set your bottle trap there. Fill it with water so that it will sink and then tie it to a near by bush. I usually use scraps from blugill after I fillet them or dry dog food for bait.

Comments

[Tragic-Tomato]

Someone else made the same thing but they used really bad pictures and I couldn't see what the heck he was doing. Thanks for making its easier to understand for me =D

[C I A H]

built one of these before and instead of stapling them together i drilled small holes in both the bottle piece and the neck that lined up and then just weaved a piece of fishing line through it and tied it to hold it together, makes it easier to open and then reclose without destroying the trap, also more holes help it sink better and attract more crawfish

[lucaskelso]

Dear mugsy knuckles, big stones wont fit through the neck of the bottle, and when i use these i usually set these before dark and check them in the mid mourning.

[A_Zombie_Killer]

Put the stones in before you put the bottle neck in.

[Mugsy Knuckles]

The only advice I can give about this is about the rocks to weight it down. Use sand or very small gravel, because when you pull it out of the water the rocks will move around, and unless the objective is to grind the catch into a medium grit paste, you should avoid heavy rocks.
Also, leaving this unattended or abandoned in the water is bad news, since it kills everything trapped in there pretty quickly. Check it once every 24 hours.

[lucaskelso]

*lemon butter

[lucaskelso]

I eat the craw fish to, i usaully boil them and dip them in lon butter but i'll have to try em fried. Cant say ive had anything bad that was fried.

[lucaskelso]

You do have to take the trap apart to get the crawdads out, but you can just re-staple it when youre done.

[rhino]

Nice instructable and I love the pictures, but if I am going to catch crawdads, I am going to eat them. I love them fried.

[oakback]

Do you have to destroy the trap to get the crawfish/minnows out?

[lucaskelso]

Thank you

[moonshinemicky]

Nice instructable, just because it's been done before doesn't mean we don't appreciate having a good pictoral tutorial to use. :)