Sometimes, when Lake Waccamaw’s white perch are hard to find or in a finicky mood, Rick Neisler uses a seine to catch minnows to use as bait. He said the native minnows catch more perch than live shiners purchased at a bait shop.
Seining minnows is a two-person affair. The anglers spot the minnows in the openings of the grass beds against the sandy bottom. Walking toward the bank with the seine between them, the anglers round up the minnows and put them in a bait bucket or livewell.
N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission regulations allow anglers to use a minnow seine of any length in Lake Waccamaw, but the ¼-inch maximum bar mesh limit in effect for seines in all other waters still applies.
Neisler uses long, telescoping fiberglass poles and spinning rods with float rigs or split-shot rigs to fish with minnows, drifting slowly through visible schools of white perch or above the structure areas that may hold them.
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