Quest Baits Blog

Craig Asks:

When fishing for carp, do the carp shy off new baits because whenever I fish with boilies it will take a long time until Ii get a bite. Does this mean that I should pre soak the boilies?

Shaun Harrison Answers:

Hi Craig,

It isn’t usual for Carp to shy away from new bait, why would they? Carp are opportunist feeders and usually investigate and take advantage of a new food source. It is nearly always tackle and angler awareness that spooks them. However if the bait is too heavily flavoured then it could be that it takes a while for the taste to be palatable. A little bit like a cup of coffee with 4 spoons of coffee – it smells fine but will taste too strong for most.

Try cutting the outer skin off your hook bait once it is on the hair but leave the ends intact to keep it tougher where the hair enters so the bait will be less likely to be pulled off. This will let the flavour leak out quicker if they are over flavoured and vice versa if they are okay it will still speed up the attraction coming from your hook bait to allow the carp to detect it quicker.

Hope this helps

Shaun

Question from Marcus,

Hi there,

I’ve been fishing big rivers for a number of years now and there’s still one aspect that continually trips me up. In my case it’s the ability to hold carp in my area on the St Lawrence River in the US/Canada. Shoals of up to 200 fish averaging low 20′s pass through the swim on a regular basis – lets say hourly. The ability to hold this shoal for longer than it takes for them to clear out the bait is almost impossible. In the past I have dumped 120Kg of maize off the side of a boat in to 24ft of clear water – 4 hours later it had all been polished off.

It’s clear that quantity of bait makes no significant difference to holding these transitory fish in one location. My thoughts turned to creating ‘distractions’ in the area through widescale use of bicarb of soda, this creates a relatively short-term fizzing and bubbling and may hold the carp due to their inquisitive nature. How I could delay the breakdown of the bicarb to give longer term attraction still troubles me today.

The final thought I have is around the ability to leave a long term attractor in the water. With the development of Gel Baits I’d hoped that the ability to leave a semi-permanent scent trail in my area would hold the fish, I fear that the quantity required would financially outweigh the benefits.

So, in a long-winded way, I’d be interested to hear of other ideas outside of piling in the bait that might be adopted to hold these large shoals long enough to pick off a fair few fish before they move on.

Thanks

Marcus

Answer from Shaun

Lots of bait or keep moving?

Hi Marcus,

From what you have said I doubt very much you would hold the fish for very long. You won’t stop the carp from doing what they have always done on the river systems and that is to graze over large areas. Even if you could introduce enough feed to hold them in an area I doubt very much you would be able to introduce enough of what they require fore a balanced diet and then they will soon be roaming again to search out the food items needed.

I certainly wouldn’t encourage you to introduce the bicarb to the river system. Yes carp are curious but will still move on if the food isn’t there for them.

All you can really do if you want to sit in the same swim is to bait with very small items of bait which take the carp much longer to clear than Maize etc. Small pellets and seeds are the most convenient to use.

Surely you are better off adopting a more mobile approach and move with the fish keeping one step ahead though. This is what I would look to be doing and catch them with minimal bait as they pass through then leapfrog again.

Hope this helps. I would be interested how the other Bloggers would tackle this situation.

Best fishes

Shaun

Question from Marcus:

Hi there,

I’ve been fishing big rivers for a number of years now and there’s still one aspect that continually trips me up. In my case it’s the ability to hold carp in my area on the St Lawrence River in the US/Canada. Shoals of up to 200 fish averaging low 20′s pass through the swim on a regular basis – lets say hourly. The ability to hold this shoal for longer than it takes for them to clear out the bait is almost impossible. In the past I have dumped 120Kg of maize off the side of a boat in to 24ft of clear water – 4 hours later it had all been polished off.

It’s clear that quantity of bait makes no significant difference to holding these transitory fish in one location. My thoughts turned to creating ‘distractions’ in the area through widescale use of bicarb of soda, this creates a relatively short-term fizzing and bubbling and may hold the carp due to their inquisitive nature. How I could delay the breakdown of the bicarb to give longer term attraction still troubles me today.

The final thought I have is around the ability to leave a long term attractor in the water. With the development of Gel Baits I’d hoped that the ability to leave a semi-permanent scent trail in my area would hold the fish, I fear that the quantity required would financially outweigh the benefits.

So, in a long-winded way, I’d be interested to hear of other ideas outside of piling in the bait that might be adopted to hold these large shoals long enough to pick off a fair few fish before they move on.

Thanks

Marcus

Question from Peter Hall:-

Hi guys,

I have been specimen fishing for a number of years, but I still struggle with settling on a bait I am 100% confident with !

My reason for this is I am restricted (like many others) to very short sessions on a variety of waters, sometimes only a couple of overnighters a month! While I understand the importance of giving the fish good nutrition in the long term, I feel that maybe attraction is what I need in the short term, am I right in presuming this ?

I feel I need to settle on a bait I can trust!

Any advice would be happily received !

Cheers
Pete,

Reply:-

Hi Pete,

a 30lb Mirror this April - the very first night these fish had been fed Ghurkka Spice

When I put baits together for the Quest Baits range instant attraction is as important as the long term nutritional benefit. Like you many other anglers simply do not have the time or possibly justify the cost of having to establish baits and wean the fish onto them. To my mind baits should work from the off anyway giving plenty of attraction and stimulation but the the added bonus after they have been eaten for the fish to have benefitted from the experience.

If I was to recommend a bait from our range now for you it would be the Ghurkka Spice and for further back up to prove it is not just sales hype by me Carpology magazine have independent Tank Tests carried out each month by James Anderson BSc (Hons). The July 2011 issue saw 14 boilies tested from 14 different bait companies and the Ghurkka Spice wiped the board with the highest marks in both tests the ‘How do the fish react to the smell of the bait’ and the ‘Do the fish actually eat the bait’.

James actually wrote…

“I’m going to mention the Ghurkka Spice from Quest. Quest boilies have been constantly high performers in the Tank Test series and always seem to really get the carp going. I’m not sure why but the level of enthusiasm the fish demonstrated for these baits was clearly up there with the best boilies tested this month. Prolonged aggressive feed stimulation for the majority of the fish in the tank”.

What more can I say?

Best fishes

Shaun Harrison

Question from Peter Hall:-

Hi guys,

I have been specimen fishing for a number of years, but I still struggle with settling on a bait I am 100% confident with !

My reason for this is I am restricted (like many others) to very short sessions on a variety of waters, sometimes only a couple of overnighters a month! While I understand the importance of giving the fish good nutrition in the long term, I feel that maybe attraction is what I need in the short term, am I right in presuming this ?

I feel I need to settle on a bait I can trust!

Any advice would be happily received !

Cheers
Pete,

Reply:-

Hi Pete,

A 30lb plus mirror the very first night the water had been fed Ghurkka Spice

When I put baits together for the Quest Baits range instant attraction is as important as the long term nutritional benefit. Like you many other anglers simply do not have the time or possibly justify the cost of having to establish baits and wean the fish onto them. To my mind baits should work from the off anyway giving plenty of attraction and stimulation but the the added bonus after they have been eaten for the fish to have benefitted from the experience.

If I was to recommend a bait from our range now for you it would be the Ghurkka Spice and for further back up to prove it is not just sales hype by me Carpology magazine have independent Tank Tests carried out each month by James Anderson BSc (Hons). The July 2011 issue saw 14 boilies tested from 14 different bait companies and the Ghurkka Spice wiped the board with the highest marks in both tests the ‘How do the fish react to the smell of the bait’ and the ‘Do the fish actually eat the bait’.

James actually wrote…

“I’m going to mention the Ghurkka Spice from Quest. Quest boilies have been constantly high performers in the Tank Test series and always seem to really get the carp going. I’m not sure why but the level of enthusiasm the fish demonstrated for these baits was clearly up there with the best boilies tested this month. Prolonged aggressive feed stimulation for the majority of the fish in the tank”.

What more can I say?

Best fishes

Shaun Harrison

First 30 of the session.

Words by Ron Key:

Much of my thinking regarding how I approach my angling, the rigs, bait, baiting etc comes believe it or not when I am socialising on the bank.  A warm night, a glass of red and good company can stimulate some interesting debate.

On a recent field testing trip for Angling Lines in France someone questioned my use of different flavours when baiting up and different combinations of flavours on multi bait rigs such as the snowman.  I’ve had a lot of success in recent years with a Quest Baits Fruity Trifle/Surf n Turf combination on the hair, and it was mentioned that this combination contained the extremes in ph levels. The Fruity Trifle being acid and the Surf n Turf being alkaline.

Now I’m no bait scientist, by profession I’m an engineer and consequently I’m a practical angler and most of my successful methods are established by trial and error on the bank.  The issue of pH in baits is one that interests me. Is there anyone who can explain how knowing the ph of the water you are fishing  and the ph of your bait can aid bait selection?  For example do I fish an alkaline bait in an acid water, or an alkaline bait in an alkaline water.  Its a question that’s cropped up many times over the years and I’ve never received a satisfactory answer. So its over to you guys.

Cheers  Ron