The present invention is directed to the field of bait containers. More particularly, the present invention is directed to a bait container which is capable of dispensing live bait swimming in water in a controlled manner.
There are two popular types of bait containers for use with live wet bait, portable and stationary. One of the most widely used portable types consists of a jar onto which a lid is threaded, the lid having a strap secured to it. To utilize this bait container, a wading fisherman must hold her/his pole and line in one hand, or in the crook of or under her/his arm, grasp the container with the one hand, unscrew the lid with the other, and pour some of the water and hopefully only one of the minnows, or other bait, into her/his hand which is holding the lid, and then resecure the lid to the container while the bait is attempting to squirm out of that hand. If the lid is not fully secured, the entire contents of the container can be lost. The process is cumbersome at best and frequently results in one or more bait being dumped onto the ground or into the water and usually results in the level of life-sustaining water in the container being reduced. This water may dampen the user""s clothing, including gloves if worn during cooler weather. To freshen the water in the container, the lid must be removed and the container submerged, risking loss of the bait within the container.
A second popular portable bait container is an oval shaped wading bucket made of galvanized steel which is of a size that can be held in a hand and can be strapped to a shoulder or the waist of a fisherman. The oval bucket has a similarly shaped lid made up of a flat surface surrounded by a side which extends about one inch above the surface. The lid fits snugly into the oval bucket, like a cork in a bottle, and must be pushed into the bucket when it is installed and pulled out of the bucket when it is removed. Holes in the flat surface of the lid allow stale water to be poured from the covered bucket and allow fresh water to enter into the covered bucket when the bucket is submerged. However, this bait container has several disadvantages. For example, when a fisherman who has the bucket attached to his or her shoulder or waist bends over, water can spill on his or her clothing. Additionally, if the container is accidentally tipped, water escapes and can cause bait, such as minnows, to die. Additionally, to secure a bait from this bait container, a fisherman must pull off the lid, hold or secure it and put his or her hand into the container to pick out a bait. It is often difficult to immediately grasp a bait because bait such as minnows swim around to avoid capture and bait such as crayfish and hellgromites often bite at a finger of the fisherman. In the process of securing the bait, the fisherman""s hands or gloves become wet, which is particularly aggravating while fishing in cold weather.
The second type of container, stationary, is exemplified by a conventional bait bucket. Bait buckets may be equipped with a lid and with a liner. The liner is perforated, and the outer bucket retains the water which drains from the liner""s openings when it is withdrawn from the bucket. To extract a bait from this container, the liner is usually partially withdrawn from the bucket to reduce the area the bait can occupy. The lid is opened and a hand inserted on a xe2x80x9cfishing expeditionxe2x80x9d to capture and secure a bait for attachment to the fish hook. This type of container is bulky and not convenient for carrying. It frequently becomes an anchor to the fisherman preventing her/him from venturing very far in search of better fishing locations. It is difficult to change the water in the linerless variety.
Some prior patents show bait containers designed to enable fishermen to more readily obtain live wet bait from them while fishing. U.S. Pat. No. 2,644,269, issued in the name of J. E. Ormisher, shows a bait container which includes a minnow trap sieve shaped like a scoop mounted near the top of the container. This bait container can be tipped on one side to cause minnows or other live bait to swim within the area of the sieve. Bait which is trapped in the sieve can be removed by a fisherman when the bait container is turned upright. U.S. Pat. No. 4,862,634, issued in the name of Wayne C. Surface, shows a similar type of bait container. This bait container has a neck at the top with a porous separator mounted within the neck. The porous separator is attached to a pivotally mounted rod which extends through the bait container and has one side fastened to a lever located outside the container. The lever is used to cause the porous separator to either cover or uncover the opening to the neck at the top of the bait container. The porous separator can be swung down into the bait container so that the neck is open when the container is turned over, allowing bait to swim into the neck of the container. The porous separator is then rotated into place to cover the opening. Thereafter the bait container can be stood upright once again. Water then flows through the porous separator, thereby trapping on the separator in the neck of the bottle any bait which may have swum into the neck. The bait containers shown in these patents can be cumbersome to use and require fishermen to wait until bait swims into the sieve or neck of the container and must be opened repeatedly to remove bait.
A bi-directional bait dispenser for connection to a bottle is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,549,227, issued in the name of James Klatz. This dispenser includes a funnel which can be attached to a narrow-necked bottle to enable bait to be scooped into the bottle. A lid which includes a spout and a series of holes next to the spout is fastened to one portion of the periphery of the funnel. When the lid is attached to the top of the funnel, the bottle can be tipped to enable water to flow out of the spout and the holes and to permit bait to swim out of the spout and into the hand of a fisherman. Obviously, the fisherman""s hand gets wet in the process of removing the bait, and water is lost from the bait container. And while the holes in the lid allow water to be poured from this bait container and fresh water to circulate within it when the container is submerged, these holes also allow water to spill on a fisherman""s clothes and to accidentally spill from the container and as a result, bait to die, as explained above.
A number of patents show bait containers which use various types of nozzles for dispensing one grasshopper, or other fishing bait not living in water, at a time. See U.S. Pat. No. 3,308,507 issued in the name of Eddie Horton, U.S. Pat. No. 4,825,577 issued in the name of Roland Branon, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,377,445 issued in the name of Roland Branon. None of these bait containers is adapted to overcoming the problems involved in obtaining live minnows and other swimming bait from water in a live bait-dispensing container.
The present invention is a container for dispensing live bait which enables a fisherman to store and remove from the container live, wet bait, such as minnows, without removing a lid from the container when fishing, while minimizing water lost from the container, and minimizing any water on the fisherman""s hands. The bait-dispensing container of this invention has a housing, including a bottom, a sidewall and a top, which at least partially encloses bait that is stored within the container. One of two ends of an exit nozzle is interconnected with one side of the housing, either the top or the sidewall. The exit nozzle extends generally in a lateral direction with respect to the housing from the area where the nozzle is interconnected with the housing and toward an exit end of the nozzle.
A flow inducement chamber is included between a side of the exit nozzle and the housing. The flow inducement chamber has at least one primary flow passage between it and the exit nozzle to allow water from the housing to flow from the exit nozzle and into the flow inducement chamber when the bait container is tipped and the exit end of the nozzle is closed off. This flow of water from the exit nozzle to the flow inducement chamber encourages bait swimming in the water to enter into the nozzle. The flow inducement chamber also has at least one secondary flow passage between it and the housing which permits water to flow from the flow inducement chamber and back into the housing. The secondary flow passage should inhibit the flow inducement chamber from filling when the bait container is tipped. This can be accomplished in any convenient manner, such as by using a one-way valve or a similar mechanism, which only allows water to flow from the flow inducement chamber to the housing. The flow inducement chamber can also be inhibited from filling when the bait container is tipped by making the secondary flow passage sufficiently small to prevent water from quickly filling the flow inducement chamber when the container is tipped. Using a mechanism, such as a one-way valve, as the secondary flow passage has the added advantage of allowing water to more quickly flow from the flow inducement chamber into the housing. Thus, in the event a bait is not retained in the nozzle when the bait container is tipped, if water flows quickly from the flow inducement chamber to the housing, the container can be immediately tipped again and water will flow through the nozzle and into the flow inducement chamber to help capture a bait in the nozzle.
The nozzle of the live bait-dispensing container of this invention can be made wider or narrower, as required, to enable live bait of different sizes, such as shiners and fatheads, to be removed from the nozzle one at a time. This can be accomplished by having containers with different sized nozzles or by adjusting the size of a nozzle of one container in any convenient manner, such as by placing an insert into the exit end of the nozzle to decrease its size.
Various other features, advantages and characteristics of the present invention will become apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art after reading the following specification. This invention does not reside in any one of the features of the containers for dispensing live bait disclosed above and in the following Detailed Description of Preferred Embodiments and claimed below. Rather, this invention is distinguished from the prior art by its particular combination of features which are disclosed. Important features of this invention have been described below and shown in the drawings to illustrate the best mode contemplated to date of carrying out this invention.
Those skilled in the art will realize that this invention is capable of embodiments which are different from those shown and described below and that the details of the structure of this container for dispensing live bait can be changed in various manners without departing from the scope of this invention. Accordingly, the drawings and description below are to be regarded as illustrative in nature and are not to restrict the scope of the invention. The claims are to be regarded as including such equivalent live bait-dispensing containers as do not depart from the spirit and scope of this invention.