Brining Baits
- Thread starter DSRTEGL
- Start date
First I am trying Wet Brining.......I have 2 baits I am working with at the moment.....Salad Shrimp and 51-60 Shrimp with Shells and Tails.......I am curing them in a mixture of SEA SALT and BORAX and I am Coloring them Using Food Coloring.........The Colors I am presently working with are Red, Yellow, Orange, and Chartreuse........NOW.......If I did the mixtures right......these baits will toughen up...take on the color....and have LONG shelf life WITHOUT having to be in the fridge.......Because these baits will be used in salt water I have NOT added any flavoring as I would with baits I use in fresh water for Trout and Catfish.....Common Flavorings are ANISE extract, GARLIC extract, and KOOL-AID......Cherry Kool-Aid works great with certain baits if you are after catfish. AND it does an excellent job of coloring the baits.
OK......I used the salad shrimp today....It did not stay on the hook very well...BUT THAT IS MY FAULT.....It takes up to a week to toughen the bait up properly and not less than 48 hours.....I used Natural, Yellow, and Orange and the Orange was producing the fastest hits.....That is normal for me....I have received messages that my salt/borax ration is off and that is 100% possible as I was throwing this stuff together at 3am after working 12 hours and did not bother to pull out my notes.....Time will tell.....
So as it now stands I have Wet Brined Salad Shrimp and 31-40 count Shell on Shrimp, as well as Mussel and Clam Meat......The Shrimp are Colored in Yellow, Orange, Chartreuse, and Red.......The Mussels and Clams are Natural. The shrimp have been wet brined for 2 weeks and I have drained them ans salt packed them for grab and go use. The mussels and clams could really use another week before being drained and packed. I also Wet Brined some random pack anchovies in Natural, Orange and Chartreuse as of today. They won't be ready to fish for a couple of weeks I think.
The whole point of this exercise is t have grab and go baits that do not require refrigeration........Put together with my telescopic rods and a basic tackle kit I plan to keep in a standard cooler.......I should be able to just jump and run if I am driving the coast and happen to see a fishy looking spot.....I have wanted to do this for a long time now.
The whole point of this exercise is t have grab and go baits that do not require refrigeration........Put together with my telescopic rods and a basic tackle kit I plan to keep in a standard cooler.......I should be able to just jump and run if I am driving the coast and happen to see a fishy looking spot.....I have wanted to do this for a long time now.
Why not go ahead and salt them. DFG recommends salted mackerel as a durable bait for rockfish, and a New Zealand site, https://www.fishing.net.nz/fishing-advice/how-to/salting-baits/, suggests that salting toughens mussels as well. My big concern is the statement about draining fluids, which suggests that a lot of flavor is being lost.
Steve
Steve
I’m trying out a brine with rock salt and just a little bit of baking soda, about 5-1 ratio in as concentrated as it can get in water. So far frozen anchovies and old left over shrimp come out pretty tough after about a week in the brine. Not sure if the scent bleeds out, but it still smells like shrimp and anchovy. I keep my baits in the jars I brine them in.
How’d the bait turn out? I attempted to save whole baits once but they ended up turning brown with the consistency of beef jurkey. They still worked as bait but not for the original target species.
I wonder how they preserve those little shad at Walmart. I’ve gotten bit on those but saltwater fish don’t really like the taste so they spit it right back out. Maybe, they need flavoring.
I wonder how they preserve those little shad at Walmart. I’ve gotten bit on those but saltwater fish don’t really like the taste so they spit it right back out. Maybe, they need flavoring.