Some time ago I scratched the surface on some of the live bait basics around Palm Beach. Though not common up this way, there is one I didn't cover. More prolific as you head south and really the best game in town when you get to the keys is live baiting with ballyhoos.
Just the fragile nature of this bait alone keeps it from being a bought commodity. They don't seem to fare very good in even the best of bait wells for much more than a fishing day, so you really need to gear up to go get them fresh every morning.
Though it's really not much more involved than driving to a reef, dropping a hook and hanging a chum bag there are quite a few tricks that can vastly improve both quantity and quality of your baits…

I for one plug wind and tide into my decision of which patch reef I want to work. Although it's not a must to have a rock pile directly under your transom it is necessary to get your chum to flow back across as much of that bottom as possible.
I approach from downwind of where I eventually want my transom to sit. Maybe as much as 300 yards before I get to the spot I set the small holed bag in. Other days it's as close as 100 yards… Use a bag with small holes because large holes allow bigger chunks of chum out and that can draw birds which can spook your hoo's. I do a zig-zag pattern to disperse as broad a scent trail as possible. Riding past my set up spot, I anchor upwind of it and feed scope out until I'm positioned correctly.
If I went in right, I should already have bait working up my slick. Some days yellowtails can get so thick the hoo's get pushed back to far to work. The easiest trick to quell them is to hook one and jerk him once in a while. Yellowtails respond well by spooking down deep when you do this. Your hoo's will appear as dimples on the surface or raindrops if you will. As they get closer you can see the red tips of their bills and tails clearly.
Now I see a load of guys make a mistake at this early stage. A big wad comes up and instantly they blast 'em with a net. They pick off some but now that school is going to be wary and much harder to get.

We, on my boat start slow. Using 4-pound spin outfits we load #14 long-shank gold hooks with tiny dots of shrimp for bait. If the wind is blowing you can simply let that same wind carry your bait back to the hoo's. Don't let it land in the tails, get it back to the hoo's. I watch the bait disappear, and in a single fluid motion flip them back into the boat where using wet hands I unhook them quick and right into a well. Hoo's like to jump - close the lid!
The quality of a hair-hooked ballyhoo is superior to a netted hoo. Their scales haven't taken a beating nor have they been dropped to the deck from a shaking net. For me a minimum of two dozen top quality ones get dropped in the well before even busting out the net.
Once the net is brought out the rest of the pit is cleared, no rods, buckets or anything to hang the net when you throw. If you shake the bag, the hoo's will thicken up but you run the risk of tails swarming and driving them back. Instead a squirt of bunker oil and a handful of oatmeal flakes will sit at the surface and bunch them up just as well.