Moss 4/9 Success!!

Joel,
Marinating your bait, you are truly possessed!!!!!

Stuart

brother Stu....uncle Joel needs all the "magic" he can use to keep up with you and the Savage  If get the chance to fish tomorrow, I may use another "magic trick"...will post if successfull 

Joel the "grass hoppa"

Allen,
SalmonU, I like it.

Never tried brining bait, but it sounds interesting.  I'm curious how much tougher the bait is and how much more shine it gets.

They way they rig their plug herring was similar to how I rigged on Sunday.  I cut my chovie the same way, removing the guts, but used a single hook and fished it backwards because the drift was so slow.  Hook it near the front, bend the bait slightly and run 2 half hitches around the tail and tighten.  Fished backwards bait spins a lot more, and works better on days with a slow drift.  If you do the same thing with whole chovies, you probably want to use rubber bands prevent the gills from flaring.

Noticeably tougher.  In fact, all tray bait out of the tray seem soft to me.  The added shine is debatable.

It's kind of funny.  Growing up in WA, everyone fished a cut plug herring on double hook rigs.  You can get any "action" you want by varying the angle of the cut.  Nobody ever used any of these fancy rotator gadgets either.  I never heard of fishing a chovie backwards until I moved to CA.  I find it odd because you never see a fish swimming backwards.  Although I suppose you never see one swimming headless either.

-Allen

Joel,

One more sign of being obsessed.  You paint your sinkers too!!!!  You got too much time on your hands.  I'm surprised you don't have dual alarm clocks set in the am.  MAYBE YOU SHOULD !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Allen,
The double hook rig on SalmonU looks very effective.  I'll have to check the reqs, but I think 2 hooks is legal, but they have to be hard tied.  Ie, no slider hook, which is a shame.  The slider would be perfect to help hold a bend in the bait.


Stuart

Well, everyone used painted lead growing up too.

A bend is not needed once you perfect the plug cut.  But if you really want the bend, use a toothpick.

-Allen

We used to sun dry bag bait on multi day trips to the delta. Once they defrost, lay them all out flat on a chunk of plywood and let the sun bake them for 2 hrs, flip and let other side bake a couple hours.  They stiffen up, the juices get locked in and they don't turn to mush when threading or put on a hook.  Tray bait got a little pricey.  When you're fishing/bbq'ing on the back of the houseboat and the "beverages" start flowing no one seems to care about putting the bait away....then the next day you find out the bait now has the consistency of pudding. 

Art - I used to do that as well... I'd lay them out on the deck of the yak to sun dry....it's better than leaving it the bag soaked with chovie juice - all that soaked bait just seems to fall apart and never seems to stick on the hook long enough. I do agree that tray baits are too expensive but I don't mind spending for it - salmon ROCK!!!

Elric (Hobie-Wan) has thrown his net from a kayak before. He said it was fairly easy.

Could you cure fresh caught chovies this way? A few hours at the poop pipe off Oyster Point could get you a pretty good ahul of bait.

I think you can brine just about anything this way.  I've tried to freeze fresh bait before and have come to the conclusion that you can't flash freeze them in a normal freezer, so brining and just refrigerating works out.  Another good part is that you can store your unused baits for weeks in the fridge and use them again on your next time out.

I had a tray of herring at Chelan that I forgot to put in the brine the night before.  They defrosted and got a bit mushy as I didn't have them in the cooler (doh!).  I droped them in a brine an hour before launch and I could definitely see the brine doing its magic over the next few hours.  I was fileting the herring to use strips and I could really see the consistency of the bait toughening up.

-Allen

Sure, you can freeze it.  The point is that you don't have to.  And even brined, it will last at normal air temps for 2-3 days.  No need to dry if you get that kind of performance, right?

-Allen

I'm a big believer in scent, but then again, I like fishfinders too, so what do I know?   

I don't know why, but anise is very popular up here for salmon fishing, especially salmon in the rivers.  I tend to use krill or herring oil in the salt and I don't add that to the brine.  I squirt a bit on when I bait up.

-Allen

Ours are in the brine.  Just hold it at room temp or put in refrigerator?

When they say they keep for weeks in the refrigerator, do they mean after brining or in the brine?

Thanks for the tips.

Pat