The Bluefin USA Guide to Catching Live Bait
We’ll break live bait fishing down by species and give you tournament-winning guides’ tips for live bait success.
How to Catch Ballyhoo for Live Bait

Ballyhoo are a trolling, live baiting, and bottom fishing staple. You can freeline them, slow troll them live, troll them dead, butterfly them, drop them to the bottom, use them as cut bait… Ballyhoo often save the day offshore. If you don’t know how to catch live bait with a cast net but you do have a Cuban yoyo or light rod on board, ballyhoo will be your best friend.
How to Catch Goggle Eyes (Bigeye Scad) for Live Bait

How to Catch Scaled Sardines (AKA Pilchards or Whitebait)

“Whitebait”, more formally called scaled sardines or pilchards, show up on grass flats in bays and estuaries. These baits love deep channels near grass flats and will spend time schooling on these shallow grass flats when the conditions are right. When you find them moving water on a flat, you know you’ve hit the money. Pilchards tend to stay around one area of a flat, dimpling the surface of the water and flashing beneath it.
Pilchards are most easily captured with a cast net, though they are also targeted in deeper water with small sabiki rigs. The Bluefin USA team likes to throw an 8 – 12-foot net with 1/4” mesh so we can black out the live wells in just a couple of throws. We’ve found flats between 3-6’ deep with strong incoming tides to be most productive.
Anchor up on the edge of the flat, put out a chum bag, and wait to see the bait flashing or making dimples on the surface of the water behind the boat. A school of pilchards looks like a patch of light rain on the water’s surface. Once they’re in range, open your cast net on them and blackout those live wells. In deeper water, locate schools of pilchards hanging near the bottom with your fishfinder Target these baits with a chum bag and sabiki rigs. Scaled sardines (pilchards) tend to hold lower in the water column than threadfin herring do, but they respond to chum very quickly.
How to Catch Threadfin Herring (AKA Greenbacks)

At times, threadfin herring can be found in similar areas to scaled sardines, but they spend more of their life cycle offshore. Threadfins are most commonly targeted schooling off beaches, off markers in passes, near range marker buoys, or in deep channels. Many anglers have a hard time telling the difference between greenbacks and pilchards when they are small. At adult sizes, the differences are apparent. The unmistakable, long, thread-like fin on the back of the bait lets you know it’s a threadfin.
Threadfin herring typically hold higher in the water column than scaled sardines do. So if your fishfinder shows a cloud of bait on the bottom in 20’ of water, they are most likely pilchards. Your threadfins will hold higher in the water column. Compared to pilchards, greenbacks also tend to make more commotion when schooling on flats.
In water between 10 – 50 feet of depth, you can mark threadfins with a fish finder and target them with sabiki rigs. These baitfish tend not to respond to chum, so save your blocks for the pilchards. Positioning your boat on top of the bait school is crucial for this method. When they’re in a hurry, skilled captains will cruise range markers or deep channels looking at their fish finder. When they mark a school of threadfins, they’ll position the boat so a mate can throw a cast net. Since these baits like to hold mid-water column, a cast net with at least 1.5 lbs/ foot weight is a necessity. 10’ – 12’ Cast nets with 3/8”+ mesh are great for this purpose.
“If you’re lucky enough to see threadfins schooling on a grass flat, nail them with your cast net and give them a free ride offshore.”
Live Bait Catching: Gear Guide
Here we’ve compiled a list of our favorite bait-catching essentials. Click the links to load up for your next bait slaying session!
Ballyhoo:
- Cast Nets in 10-12’+ range with 3/8″-1/2″ mesh
- Ballyhoop Folding Hoop Nets
- #14 Mustard Long Shank hooks (bronze)
- Small Bobber Floats
- Tournament Master: Blue Label, double-ground chum
- Chum Bag
Goggle Eyes:
- Sabiki Rigs
- Floating Bait Pen (stored in the water)
- Tournament Master: Green Label chum (x2)
- Chum Bags (x2)
Scaled Sardines (AKA Pilchards/ Whitebait):
- Cast Nets in the 8-12′ range with 1/4″-3/8″ mesh
- Small Sabiki Rigs
- Tournament Master: Blue Label, double-ground chum
- Fine Mesh Chum Bag
Threadfin Herring:
- Sabiki Rigs
- For Larger Baits: Heavy Cast Nets in the 10-12′ range with 1/2″-3/4″ mesh
- For Smaller Baits: Heavy Cast Nets in the 10-12′ range with 1/4″-3/8″ mesh
In future articles, we’ll show you more of the secrets on how to catch live bait!
Tight Lines & Good TImes
-Bluefin USA
excellent comprehensive and well written tutorials!
Thanks!