approximately 70°F.
Spawning begins in the spring when water temperatures reach approximately 70°F, and may continue into the summer. During spawning, one or more females are accompanied by several males. Like gizzard shad, threadfin shad are most commonly found in large rivers and reservoirs.
How do you catch threadfin shad?
Sometimes the best way to catch them is to hang a light over the side of the boat and just drift in the open water. Afternoons they will move into some coves. Shad move back into the creeks and coves but cold fronts move them out into deeper water. Best bet is to try and get bait before a front hits.
Where is the best place to catch shad?
In the Western US, the Colombia and Sacramento rivers are the best places to fish shad. In the Eastern US, the best place to find shad is in the Connecticut river. However, shad can be found in rivers as far south as Florida.
What is the best shad bait?
The best bait for American shad are small, artificial lures including jigs, spinners, spoons and similar lures. Shiny or brightly colored lures work best, although shad also are known to bite a shiny bare hook, especially attached to a swivel to give it some swaying action.
What color is a threadfin shad?
Description: Threadfin Shad are relatively small forage fish with a body shaped like a lance. They have a flattened belly with a sawtooth belly. They are usually silver in color fading to black or blue near the caudal fin. Threadfin and gizzard shad both have a long thread like filament at the end of the dorsal fin.
How often do threadfin shad spawn?
Threadfin Shad
Spawning temperature: 67-70 degrees. Spawning time: Threadfin spawn during late April in Southern reservoirs. Reproduction Cycles: Threadfin shad can spawn several times per year. It’s not uncommon for threadfin to spawn a second time in mid July, and again in September or early October.
Where do shad go in winter?
In the winter, when the water grows much colder, the shad migrate back out of the creeks and into main lake depths. On some lakes, this can easily be 40 to 60 feet deep.
What time of year is best for shad?
Best time from mid-March to early May in fall line areas of tidal rivers as adults return to spawn. Light spincasting rods and reels, with 1/32 to 1/8 oz., brightly colored shad darts, spoons, jigs, or small minnow imitation lures. Fly fishing with darts, gold or white soft-bodied streamers, and other wet flies.
What size hooks for shad fishing?
Use a 5/0 Circle Hooks when targeting Catfish with Cut pieces of Shad or Carp.
What do threadfin shad eat?
Plankton
Feeding habits: Plankton is the main food source for threadfin shad. They run in schools of similar size fish and you often see them feeding right on the surface late in the day when photosensitive plankton rises to the top as the sun sets.
What do you throw during shad spawn?
Here is the list of my top 10 baits to throw during the shad spawn.
- #1 – Spinnerbait. The spinnerbait is the best.
- #2 – Swim Jig. I love a white swim jig here.
- #3 – Swimbait. This is a 4” to 7” size tail thumping swim bait.
- #4 – Finesse Swim Bait.
- #5 – Hollow Frog.
- #6 – Shallow Crankbait.
- #7 – Buzzbait.
- #8 – Chatterbait.
Can you catch shad with worms?
American shad, a type of herring native to the East Coast, are thriving in local rivers and showing up in Puget Sound in “unprecedented numbers,” according to a state biologist. But Oregon State University scientists recently found that the fish can be heavily infected with parasitic worms — up to 89 in a single fish.
How do you use dead shad as bait?
The easiest way to hook them (and my preferred method) is to insert the hook through the top of the head and then turn the fish and push it onto the hook, then hooking the bait again through the tail, or back area. Cut shad can be hooked in a variety of ways and the fish can be cut in a variety of ways as well.
Are threadfin shad good for ponds?
Shad are an excellent source of forage for farm ponds and lakes. Size ranges from 1-7 inches. A load of shad consist of 7-10,000 fish and a single load will treat up to a ten acre pond.
How big do threadfin shad grow?
They occur naturally in many rivers and reservoirs throughout the southeast and are often stocked as a forage fish in sport fish ponds in the southern latitudes. A mature threadfin shad is usually 5 to 6 inches in length; however, we have observed them up to 7 inches in highly-fertile ponds.
Are threadfin shad good bait?
Threadfin shad are a great bait for catching blue catfish and regardless of whether you are fishing for smaller blue catfish or after that next monster catfish using whole threadfin shad is an excellent bait option for catching blue cats.
How do you know when Shads are spawning?
“One way to tell if the shad are spawning is to throw a spinnerbait,” he said. “You’ll actually see the shad follow your spinnerbait back to the boat, and you’ll feel them nipping the blades on your spinnerbait. “You see that and you know you’re in the right area.”
How long does a shad spawn last?
“The shad spawn will last two, three, or maybe four weeks. It usually starts in one area of the lake and you might go to the other end of the lake and find nothing, so you have to be moving until you see the activity.”
How fast do threadfin shad grow?
In Lake Havasu, California, threadfin shad grew at the rate of about one inch per month until reaching three inches. At the formation of the first annulus lengths range from 1.8 to 3.4 inches (Burns, 1966). Few attain an age of over two years or lengths over seven inches (Par- sons and Kimsey, 1954).
Do shad bite in the cold?
The bottom line is that you can catch your own shad in the cold water period, you just need to use the right tools to catch them, you need to be in the right location and you need to put forth a little extra effort to catch them.
Can shad live in cold water?
Threadfin shad are great bass forage but they die once the water temperatures reach the low 40’s especially if the water temperature stays too cold for too long. Ice may equal dead shad.