Thomas, We had a family of Swanks in the town I grew up in Keithsburg, Illinois. Henry Swank name comes to mind. No negative recolections at all with the name Swank. Any niceuns I get on are usually in Southeast Iowa as it is MUCH better managed than Illinois waters. Mike Searl--aka--Illinoisgiller---aka ole giller on BluegillTalk.com.

Thomas...as I was growing up in a small town in N.C. crawfish was then and still is my top live bait and alot of time its my artificial lure choice as well. When I was young we moved to N.C. and my grandmother took me fishing ALOT and showed me all her tricks and spots at Waccamaw River. Sometimes we used crickets,most of the time we used small to medium size crawfish! We just hook them thru the tail about 1/2" up or slide the hook just under its shell and then tie the line on. (Be careful with sliding under the shell to not go to deep and kill them.) Trick is..keep them alive! Now at Waccamaw River we fished on bottom with an egg sinker about two feet up from the bait so the crawfish could move around. Every now and then pull it a bit in case it finds a hiding spot. Or we would cast out and drag it across the bottom back in. We would catch monster bluegill or as grandma called 'em,blue bream.We also caught red bream(biggest bluegill and red bream..lots over 2 pnds!),warmouth and even the catfish,black fish and the bass ate 'em up!! Go with larger crawfish and could get monster catfish(biggest cat out of waccamaw river i caught with live crawfish was 37 pnds!!) and bigger black fish and bass as well.(Biggest bass with live crawfish was over 12pnds! I was 12 yrs old!)
I have never stopped fishing since! I have grown up and moved away but I have tried and done the same live crawfish bait and teq...it has ALWAYS paid off. I have even used live crawfish on a slip bobber..let set just off bottom and BAM!! My son and I just last weekend fished a pond and put live crawfish on bobbers only 'bout 4' under and we tore big bluegills and bass up!! So try different things...no telling what might work and just may surprise you! Here is something to remember...90% of fish that I catch(from down south and from up North)that I have cleaned have had crawfish in their belly!! Make live crawfish one of your top choices,you will catch fish,and in most cases bigger fish.