Preserving boilies.

[Carp Angler]

I use various methods to dry out my baits for long term preservation.
Putting them in with a bucket of pellet or dry particles are two such ways.
Whilst this is adequate for small amounts, attempting to do this with 20kgs may prove troublesome, space wise.

Has anyone tried sugar or other methods of drying/preserving baits?

 

[Andy Thatcher]

Sugar works. I used it to transport 30kg of fresh Activ8 to Germany for a mate who then drove it to Spain. No problems at all. These were made by the Bait Company so were not frozen at all. I put them in orange boxes for a couple of days to dry and the day before I started my drive over there I popped the bait into 4 buckets then added sugar.

 

[Carp Angler]

Any more detail Andy?

Sealed buckets with lids?
A bag of sugar, or enough to cover the boilies?
How many boilies to how much sugar etc etc?

 

[Rob Brownfield]

Rik. I have always air dried first, then packed sweet baits in sugar and savoury baits in salt. Fishmeals can go in either.

With the salt, I only leave them for a week, then riddle the salt off and store them in a hessian sack. The surared baits I leave as they are. I use buckets with lids for these ones.

I have also air dries, then packed in rice. Once at the water, the rive gets soaked and used as bait as well.

 

[Andy Thatcher]

Kind of used the force ! I remembered an article by Hutchy (?) wouldn't swear by that though.

Sealed Buckets with 4kg of sugar per bucket looked about right so went with that. I had bought 15kg from a cash & carry. I split the bait into 4 buckets so that was 7.5kg per bucket. Weight wasn't a problem as I drove.

 

[Carp Angler]

Thanks chaps, it's for a trip, so I'll probably continue to do it in the pellet as I'll be taking that anyway.

I think I'll try an amount in some sugar over the next few days to see how it goes.

 

[ED (The ORIGINAL and REAL one)]

Rob ---- Whats the best way of air drying them .......??

 

[Jim Everiss]

I recently purchased a 'vac packing' machine for my business and have been using it for vacuum packing my boilies in 1/2 kilo lots.It is absolutely superb and i have been able to re-freeze after a warm (rarely)weekend fishing with the boilies not suffering from exposure to the air or moisture.I have kept vac-packed boilies for 3 weeks in a fridge without any signs of deteriation in colour,texture or smell at all.I also find it superb for 'glugging'with boilies put in the bag and covered in the glug and then vac-packed.It really seems to give an edge.I suggest you make friends with your local butcher and get him to vac-pack your baits - you will be suprised at the extended life this gives.
Cheers,Jim.

 

[Paul Williams]

Eddie,
Rob may have another way but i was told an open weave ( landing net?) sack in the airing cupboard and move them about a lot.....wish i was coming!!!!, and if i were i would take note of Fletch's thread on FM when selecting my bait

 

[GrahamM]

I've just tried a dozen thawed out, previously frozen 18mm boilies, in micro trout pellets and after three days they were as hard as bullets. I've got 10kg of these pellets so it's no problem doing a good quantity of boilies.

Then maybe vacuum packing them as Jim suggests is the best way of storing them. You can buy small vacuum packers for about ?20.

 

[Cakey]

Rik
Have you tried glugging ?
a friend at a bait company told me to glug my frozen baits in olive oil with a small amount of flavour.
only problem I found was they are heavey to lug around but last for ever.

CAKEY

 

[Cakey]

Rik
Have you tried glugging ?
a friend at a bait company told me to glug my frozen baits in olive oil with a small amount of flavour.
only problem I found was they are heavey to lug around but last for ever.

CAKEY