I had 24 Bluegill in my homemade bait well that I caught 1 day prior to my fishing trip. I have a 48 qt. cooler that I have installed bubblers and filters. I use a powerful household 120V AC bubbler and an inverter for my boat.

Anyway, Yesterday was extremely hot and humid and I had been keeping Ice in the baitwell..I had added some Fresh water and ice at about 3 pm and when I was ready to leave the house at 7pm, I added about 5 pounds of ice so it would suffice for the whole night (I did not bother to check the water temp before adding the ice). The fish were very lively and doing well.
I got to my fishing spot and started throwing a net for some shad while my daughter decided she wanted to look at the bait fish. She opened the cooler and asked, "What happened to the fish?" "The look dead, they are all laying on the bottom on their side or upside down". I checked the fish and there was not the first sign of movement.

I was really mad and did not know what happened. So I cut up a bunch of shad and loaded up 5 rods with cut bait and my daughter told me that at least one fish was still alive...so I put it on a hook and hoped it would last a little while.

Next, she opened the bait well again about 30 minutes later and there was "another live one"...Anyway, I stuck my hand in the water to catch it so I could see what was going on...it felt like the water was about 35 degrees in that cooler.. I picked up what looked like a dead fish and it was hard and stiff as a board. I raised it out of the water and the eyes moved a little. I rubbed it a little and the fish started flopping.

I removed about 4 gallons of the bait well water and replaced it with warm lake water and within 10 minutes all of the bluegill were alive and kicking just as they had been before I left the house.
I reel up some of the cut bait and put on some fresh live bait and we had a blast.

My 12-year-old daughter reeled in a nine-pound Flathead, a 5-pound channel, and a couple other smaller channels on the cut bait! The Flat tie was "ON" within 15 minutes of us starting to fish and she was excited. She talked about 90 mph the whole night. I think I might have a new fishing partner. Now if I could just get her to tie that anchor rope correctly!
Thanks
Mathew

[katfish]

Keeping bait alive in hot weather is normally pretty hard.

I think you were close to the answer with the ice.
So much ice so quickly will often cause a fast temp drop
in your baitwell(especially with aeration). This will cause
baits to go into shock and often die.

Suspend your ice in small amounts above the water line and as it
melts it will keep the water cooler.

Before removing baits to put in the water you need to temper the
bait cooler water with lake water to slowly bring it closer to
the warmer temperature or the baits will go into shock when you
put them in the lake.

Putting several baits into tempered water before fishing in another
cooler or bucket would be advisable. Don't overcrowd bait wells because the aerators cannot dissipate the amonia (from fish peeing) quickly enough in warm water to allow oxygen saturation in the bait well.

In warmer weather I often transport baits in a livewell and transfer them to a panfish basket when I arrive at the fishing site.

[shortbus]

Don't overcrowd bait wells because the aerators cannot dissipate the amonia (from fish peeing) quickly enough in warm water to allow oxygen saturation in the bait well.

Never thought of that but it makes sense.