Richard asked;
How many 18mm or 20mm boilies do you get to the kg ?
It is very difficult to give the number of 20mm or 18mm baits per kg as different base mixes have different densities. For example you may get more fruity trifle per kg than you would special crab. However, if you have 100, 20mm boilies it is equivalent to 137 18mm boilies. continue reading…
Hi chaps,
Fished for a long time using my own rolled bait also shop bought frozen and on a few occasions shelf-life baits. Frozen baits I always keep in a metal flask. Now I will only be able to fish short sessions for a while - dawn until dinnertime so how will I get the best out of my bait… keeping it frozen, or taking it out the freezer the night before?” Many thanks, Mac
Hi Mac,
It depends to an extent the type of bait and the size of the bait in question. Personally at this time of the year (late winter) I would take most conventional boilies out the night before and simply keep them cool overnight so they thaw slowly.
I don’t like to bait with frozen boilies in the winter but have no problems at all during the summer.
During the summer I would keep the baits frozen as long as possible. When using cool boxes and flasks for bait storage I prefer to load them a few days before I am going fishing then keep them in the freezer until I actually go. Cooling the container right down in the freezer certainly keeps the bait fresher for longer.
Best fishes, Shaun
Jason wrote:
“Do you personally use the shelf life or freezer baits?”
Hi Jason,
These days I find myself using shelf life baits more and more. Had you asked me the question just a few years ago I would have told you I never use shelf life baits. I had bad experiences with shelf life baits when the first few started to hit the market. I very much proved to myself that they were no-where near as effective as fresh frozen baits.
However, technology moves forward all the time. I can’t vouch for any other companies baits but I can certainly vouch for Quest Baits. The only difference between my shelf life baits and the fresh frozen equivalents are the type of egg used and the drying process. Everything else is the same. Same flavour levels, same ingredients etc. continue reading…
Question by Martin Almey;
Hi there,
I am off to Maurepaire this May for a week (booked thru angling lines) and was wondering if I could get some advise on de & rehydrating my baits as there are no freezer facilities at this lake.
I have always fished with frozen baits and usually take my baits out the freezer the night before and leave them to defrost/semi-dry.
I then just use them as they are without rehydrating at all but the baits only last 36-48hrs before they are off.
Can you give some advise on how to keep say 10kg of boilies at their best for trip to Maurepaire?
Thank you in advance, Kind regards, Martin.
Hi Martin,
I normally take my baits frozen, by that I mean straight out of the freezer as I am loading the car. I will then wrap them in a few bags to stop leakage of moisture onto any of the other gear.
Upon arrival at the lake I place them under the bed chair for the first night as I am generally too busy and tired to mess about. After this I place them in air drying bags (the key is to not place too many in each bag). They harden up over the course of the week but if you keep turning them in the bag and keep them away from moisture they should be just fine like this.
Another option is to air dry them at home a couple of weeks before you set off. A good way of looking after them is by then placing them in a cardboard box with either salt or pellet as these will both further draw the moisture from the bait.
If you then feel the need to re-hydrate them I would recommend Shaun’s approach of soaking them in hemp juice. You can see how to do this on the Quest website & Blog, as Shaun has written about it in his Carpworld articles.
Alternatively you could take Questbait shelflife boilies. I have always prefered freezer bait myself but believe me these shelflife baits are fantastic and hold their own against the freezer baits comfortably.
Just a bit more information for you;
I fished Maurepaire in August 2005 and had a pretty good result, if you take a look on the Angling Lines website you will see my article.
We fished peg 3 and I was casting right in front of peg 2 at about 120yards (roughly). I cannot say the situation will be the same when you go but I got through 30kilo of Rahja during the week and about 5 kilos of hemp if memory serves me correctly. Obviously this may not be the approach to use during the week when you go but it may be worth taking a few bags of shelf lifes just in case. You can always bring them home.
I hope some of this is helpful and it would be great if you could let me know how you get on.
Thanks, Jamie
Question from Tom Booth;
“Just wondering what is your best bait and why?”
Hi Tom,
That is a very broad question! We have put together a range of baits to cover as many types of fishing situation and bait application, that anglers are likely to come up against. I have drawn on the near thirty years I have been involved in carp fishing to produce it. The range now consists of eight different boilies, including fish meals, bird foods and a liver base mix.
Not all these baits have the same application. continue reading…
I guess it would raise a fair few eyebrows if I told you that I rarely use a conventional, freshly-frozen or preserved shelf life boilie. What is more, I can’t see myself using conventional boilies in the distant future either. All the boilie-type baits I use are air-dried then re-hydrated.
Why?
Because I get a lot more takes on them than I ever did on conventional baits!
Although I have messed around air-drying baits in the past I must admit, like a lot of anglers before me, it was simply to try and produce harder baits or to semi-preserve them on a longish session, rather than use preservatives that I don’t really understand.
It wasn’t until I joined the infamous Mangrove Syndicate in deepest Shropshire that I came up with an idea that I thought might just give me a bit of an edge over the other members. I was struggling. Yes, I was catching carp, but not as many as some of the other members. This is when my old grey matter usually starts to bubble away at its greatest capacity. I was racking my brains for an edge. It had been years since I had last fished such a silty lake. The whole of the lake bottom seemed to comprise deep silt in the clean areas or mega-deep silt in the other bits.
