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The recipe and process is pretty simple. If they are very hard and rubbery, you have left them too long in the salt and if they are mushy, you haven’t left them long enough in the salt. When freezing baits for future use, they should be soaked in the brine for approx. If you’ve ever tried to use a pilchard that has been frozen and thawed out a few times you soon realise it doesn’t work. Whole or filleted, as flappers or strips, its sheer versatility puts other baits to shame, explains Steve Walker.If the mackerel were an endangered species we'd treat it with more respect. If you have buy good quality pilchards, keep them near frozen till use and hook them on well then there should be no need for the above. Learn how to save bait till next time - the easy, freezer free way.
The bigger 8in-12in specimens, known as pilchards and bought frozen from supermarkets, are even softer than herrings, and cannot be cast very far, so they make a better supporting cast than a hookbait. Joined: Feb 4, 2011 Messages: 600 Trophy Points: 28. Simple modifications you can do You want to end up with diced pieces about 1 or 2cm square. Whenever I use mackerel the head, guts and tail go into the water to lay down a scent trail.
Whole or filleted, as flappers or strips, its sheer versatility puts other baits to shame, explains Steve Walker. The skin is tough Good bait but good quality pillies I think are better for all round bait. When I am after mullet any remaining flesh on the filleted backbone is scraped off and mixed with bread to form groundbait. We share a recipe for Alder smoked scallops with citrus and garlic butter sauce, courtesy of Traegergrills. They only smell up close, and have an incredibly pungent reek. In south-west Scotland, on the other hand, joey mackerel weigh only a few ounces and can be used whole for most species from boat or shore. Get the knife going like a paper-cutting guillotine and feed the fish in nose first. This means you’ll still have to remove the animal from the shell on the boat, beach or rocks, which is a pain when there’s a hot bite on the go. Every angler should carry a sharp filleting knife because it is always better to cut a piece of bait from a fillet than hack away at a whole fish. Alive soft-bait liquid would also be worth trying. We sell a huge range of Sea baits including Wild Ragworm, Squid, Sand Eels, Blueys, Mackerel, Peeler Crabs and Black Lug to name a few. Fillet the fish, rinse them in fresh water and dry on a paper towel, then place the baits on a metal tray in the freezer.
I find shop bought squid is not that good but freshly caught squid is number 1 for all bait.
It’s cheap, easy and clean, and means you get a lot more distance out of those unfinished bags of pillies that typically get chucked in the back of the freezer and forgotten about until only good for berley. Salt-curing your own freshly caught fish not only saves room in the freezer, but it also connects you to an age-old preservation method. The fringing hairs and the odd pea crab should go in too.
This helps to prevent freezer burn, and your baits will be all the better for it. Salting Baits. If the mackerel were an endangered species we'd treat it with more respect.
Strips, chunks, fillets or even the whole fish, depending on the size of the quarry, are snapped up by everything from the largest shark to the smallest dab, and a less obvious use for mackerel strip is as a cod bait, particularly from the shore. Mackerel bait will catch just about every fish in the sea, so why don't we exploit its full potential? I’ve read that the salt will ‘burn’ the flesh after 24 hours, but I’ve left bait in the salt for many weeks and it’s come out fine. However, they have some negatives: they take a bit of work to get out of the shell, they’re pretty slimy, and everything loves them, including spotties, leatherjackets, hiwihiwi, crabs and other hook-strippers. If mackerel have been bought from a supermarket or from the wet fish counter of a fishmongers they should be taken home immediately and put into the fridge, where they will keep for for several days hours. Use table salt or sea salt as your curing medium before air-drying the fish.