Ground bait recipes

[mikench]

I have loads of different gb's in small amounts left over and plan to mix some together!

Are there any tried and tested formulae? . For example I have lots of liquidised bread both white and brown plus dead maggots in the freezer. Should I combine them .

I have some method mixes so plan to add pellets to this or vice versa!

I plan to float fish tomorrow with punch on the hook for roach and lob for perch

 

[stillwater blue]

I don't understand. Are you asking for groundbait recipes or what to add to your groundbait?

Personally I use breadcrump as a binder in as low a quantity as possible, I think other things are better nutrionally and/or more attractive to fish.

I fish with a couple of French fellas and they're streets ahead of the average UK angler when it comes to groundbait, they taylor make each groundbait to the target species and water type. They place a massive emphasis on groundbait.

 

[mikench]

I have the remnants of several types of gb! Each on its own is not enough for even a few hours fishing. I wondered what other people did in these circumstances . I use crumb on its own usually!

Par example would you mix Ringers method mix with senses bloodworm?

 

[iain t]

To build my depleting GB stock i mix it with Chichen feed. The same as you can buy from Pets at home. I buy the same stuff in 25kg bags but from an animal feed store.

 

[Peter Jacobs]

Are these ground baits that have been previously mixed?

Personally I am no lover of home made ground baits at all preferring to use continental mixes. the main reason for this is that home made mixes tend to consist of a very high quantity of "feed" ingredients whereas a continental mix has feed, attractants, colourings, binding agents and stimulators.

I think many forget that the reason we use ground bait is to "attract" fish and not to over feed them . . . . .

Using commercial mixes if I have any left overs in small quantities then it goes in the bin as I found out years ago that the active ingredients once wetted and stored seem to fail to be as active the second time around.

Just my thoughts and I know there will be others claiming that home made are every it of good as commercial mixes . . . . personally though I would far prefer to use Expo or Gris Gardons in lieu of large quantities of whizzed-up Vitalin mixed with bread crumb.

The only time I use bread crumb, white or brown, is to bulk out a continental mix when needing to knock-up 5 or 6 kilos for a big match like the old Danish or Scandinavian Masters . . . . .

 

[mikench]

Yes all proprietary brands. I was only referring to mixing them up and whether anybody had a particular preference! I will create a little melange for next time out and see what happens as it seems a waste to throw the remains away. The remains, for the avoidance of doubt, are not what I have left over at the end of a session but what is left in the original bag!

For all I know Sensas red lake and Super crush green may be the piscatorial equivalent of bangers and mash!

 

[robcourt82]

I rarely mix up full bags but quite often use 2 or 3 different baits in a mix. Pleasure fishing if I had enough different bits and bobs I'd happily throw them together providing I thought they would compliment each other.
Recently I have started to use a fair bit of brown crumb in my non carp mixes, i think it adds a good food value, is good value and let's be honest, there's not many fish that don't like a bit of bread.

 

[stillwater blue]

Just my thoughts and I know there will be others claiming that home made are every it of good as commercial mixes . . . . personally though I would far prefer to use Expo or Gris Gardons in lieu of large quantities of whizzed-up Vitalin mixed with bread crumb.

It's easy enough to make a homemade continental style groundbait mix and yes there alot more effective than whizzed-up vitalin.

3 parts brown crumb,
3 parts grilled ground hemp,
2 parts grilled ground peanuts,
1 part coriander,
and 1 part PV1

Is a nice river roach groundbait and not too expensive or difficult to make.

 

[rayner]

I am exactly the same as Peter Jacobs in that I buy branded products.
I've had my time trying to save a few quid regarding baits, Tried Vitalin and layers mash even blitzed dog biscuits. I've gone down the drying bread and grinding it.
I've now come to the conclusion that top quality bait is far more effective.

Manufacturers of Ground baits put in a lot of research to get the best possible product.
It's simple if a groundbait is not up to another companies standard it won't sell. They are all trying to better each other.
With regard to left over GB if it's dry I save it, once mixed I use it all.

I would never add any ground hemp to groundbait without soaking it over night. Ground/crushed hemp is very active, if I'm using GB it's to keep fish on bottom where my hook bait is. Crushed hemp rises in the water taking fish with it if it's not soaked.

 

[stu_the_blank]

There's only one way to find out! Bangers and mash or cold kippers and custard!

Roach can be finikity and Perch have different dietary requirements but Chub, Barbel and Carp, they'd probably wolf down the cold kippers and custard if they were human.

Give it a go and let us know how you get on. After all the commercial mixes were only stumbled upon by trial and error (field testing).

Stu

 

[mikench]

I plan to ! It will be a real cocktail mix!

 

[sam vimes]

I won't generally mix obviously disparate commercial groundbait types, even just to use bits up. Cutting in some crumb to bulk an expensive branded mix out a bit is another matter. However, that doesn't make the financial sense it once did as plain crumb seems almost as expensive as a decent branded groundbait these days.

Adding some loosefeed (caster, chopped worm, maggot, corn, hemp etc) is another matter. I'll happily add those to a groundbait depending on the target species and intended hookbait. I doubt that there's ever a time where I'd consider making more than two loosefeed additions to a groundbait mix. What may seem like covering all the bases to some is more like limiting the chances of a hookbait being taken to me.

 

[Jim Crosskey 2]

An interesting point around this is just how precise you want to be and also, what the purpose of the groundbait is? When either method fishing on well stocked lakes for carp or feeder fishing the wye for barbel, the main purpose I see for the groundbait is to carry sufficient loose feed to get the swim going. So that usually means the GB has a large amount of different size pellets within (or is plugging an open-ended feeder with pellets in the middle).

As Stu says below, the chub, barbel and carp of this world will get themselves in a frenzy and have any old garbage we throw at them, so if they were the targets - and you had a nice supply of loose feed to augment it - then I'd throw caution to the wind, dump whatever leftover bits of GB in a bucket and mix it.

However, I might be a little more cautious if it was a nice fine GB that I was looking for - but having said that, I'm a) always keen on a fishing experiment and b) notoriously tight! So I think I'd still knock the constituent parts together, however I would pay close attention to the consistency and make sure it got a good riddling before I was going to use it. I agree that the bait companies put a lot of research in to making the best possible bait, however I'm not going fishing for a living, it's a bit of fun isn't it? When I think of it, the finesse (or lack of) in creating GB mixes is one of the major banter points between myself and my best fishing pals, if I turned a the a**e-end of several bags of GB into something even half-way effective then that would be bragging rights to me for a couple of sessions, bearing in mind the efforts that some of the others go to!

 

[nottskev]

There's a whole world of knowledge out there when it comes to groundbaits. I've watched two Alan Scothorne videos just. In one, 10 of 33mins is devoted to choosing and preparing groundbait ( feeder); in the other, (pole),18 of 35 mins is spent on it. The timings flag up the importance of the groundbait, relative to tackle and technique.

I'm quite prepared to bow to the experts, but when it comes to using up a few left-overs, I'm with Jim - mix it up and try it; at worst, it won't work very well, and it's not the world championships. Most groundbaits will serve to plug a feeder....

And that said, although I'm usually quite fussy about fresh bait and suitable groundbait, to the point where I won't go out without it, I sometimes wonder how much of that is a confidence thing rather than a strict necessity. I often fish with a friend whose bait can horrify me - a few dozen viable maggots in a tub of castering ones; casters more than a week old; expander pellets fridged for a week or two;a few worms out of the flower bed; a box of assorted pellets; some generic "groundbait" that was lying about; a barbel rig with the pellet still glued to the hook from a session months ago. And yes, it's likely we'll catch as much as each other on any given day.