Bronze Maggots

[sam vimes]

When I said they do use it in my local shop I didn't mean everyone else uses it...I really have no idea how many shops still use it.
As I said earler though, if the yellow is coming off the maggots onto your fingers i'd be very supicious as it can't have been injested by the maggots.

I knew what you meant. The doubt arises because some claim a blanket "they" definitely still use Chrysoidine for bronze maggots. Others claim that it was banned in the eighties (it wasn't banned at all, as far as I can tell). Many shops don't colour their own maggots. Some shops swear blind that Chrysoidine isn't used. Many have no idea what their suppliers use. There's no doubt in my mind that, whatever they are using, it's invariably a surface dye, that doesn't automatically mean it is Chrysoidine though.

However, when there's an alternative to Chrysoidine, there was such a fuss over its use, and H&S regulations are what they are, it amazes me that anyone in the tackle trade would be taking the risk with a suspect carcinogen. Sounds like a ruinous law suit waiting to happen. The problem is that a bronze maggot user may struggle with absolute proof that their cancer was caused by bronze maggots. However, I still suspect that using a carcinogen in this way will still be breaking all sorts of H&S legislation.

The biggest issue is that there seems to be quite a few different dyes which are known as variations of "Chrysoidine" (Chrysoidine A, B, G, J, M, Y and R, plus a whole lot more). There doesn't appear to be one single Chrysoidine product. Perhaps what was known as Chrysoidine in the eighties is not the same stuff as is being used now? Looking at the Coshh datasheets for the variations I can find, there's nothing in them to suggest that they are carcinogens. Plenty of other good reasons that the Saturday boy shouldn't be using them in the back of a tackle shop though.

 

[kenpm]

Aniline based dyes are all derived from benzine which is considered to be carcinogenic so all the dyes manufactured from it like Chrysodine Auromine Rhodamine etc. are labeled as such by association.

These dyes were then banned from inclusion in human foodstuffs after many years of use and at the same time ICI who make the stuff recommended that they should not be used in any situation where contact was expected,it was suggested at the time that anglers often put maggots in their mouth before using them which shows the sort of research they actually did if any they are still used for dying cardboard boxes for example.

Bronze maggots are surface dyed by adding dye after the maggot is fully grown as opposed to red (Rhodamine) Yellow (Auromine) and Disco (mixture of two) which are applied to the feed and absorbed into the internal content of the maggot.
None of the colours were ever banned from use although certain people who had an interest in an alternative product tried very hard to get the NFA to introduce a ban on bronze maggots in particular but this never happened.
Coloured maggots were banned in Holland particularly red for a different reason which was the dyes colouring the Eel population that the Dutch love to eat.

There was never a proven conclusive link to the reports that dyes may cause bladder cancer which was what killed Clive Smith and was reported to be the cause but bladder cancer along with prostate cancer kills thousands of men who have never seen a maggot let alone touched one.

 

[nottskev]

Bronze maggots are surface dyed by adding dye after the maggot is fully grown as opposed to red (Rhodamine) Yellow (Auromine) and Disco (mixture of two) which are applied to the feed and absorbed into the internal content of the maggot.
.

Do you know why some colours are introduced through feed, but bronze via surface dye? Just curious.

I was expecting to find more definitive statements on the carcinogenic nature of some of the dyes used, but couldn't find reference to studies other than ones that were inconclusive. Even so, I'm happy to avoid them.

 

[mikench]

The word is " Causation" when it comes to bringing a claim for negligence/ employers liability in relation to the contracting of a fatal (or otherwise) personal injury! I suspect it would be very difficult to prove for the average angler who had handled bronze maggots every so often as opposed to the man in the tackle shop who produces gallons of them every week for 30 years!

 

[kenpm]

Do you know why some colours are introduced through feed, but bronze via surface dye? Just curious.

I was expecting to find more definitive statements on the carcinogenic nature of some of the dyes used, but couldn't find reference to studies other than ones that were inconclusive. Even so, I'm happy to avoid them.

The maggot farms always dyed that way because it worked better and there are very few studies because they can not prove a link its merely speculation about a "possible" link.

Chrysoidine (IARC Summary & Evaluation, Supplement7, 1987)

 

[nottskev]

The word is " Causation" when it comes to bringing a claim for negligence/ employers liability in relation to the contracting of a fatal (or otherwise) personal injury! I suspect it would be very difficult to prove for the average angler who had handled bronze maggots every so often as opposed to the man in the tackle shop who produces gallons of them every week for 30 years!

I see your point from the legal angle - establishing things like fault, responsibility, entitlement to compensation (and their various fancy names ) and so on.

I was wondering more about the issue that would have to come before that - whether there was any medical consensus - studies, reports etc -that confirmed it as a carcinogen that ought to be restricted or banned, and whether anything like restriction or ban actually happened. Perhaps the scare around chrysoidine was enough to put suppliers and buyers off maggots dyed with it?

If so, fair enough. Nothing wrong with a bit of caution, and although bronze maggots seemed de rigueur in the world of 70's river match fishing, it's not as if we can't do without them.

 

[mikench]

I have never considered the point Kev and doubt there are any studies involving maggots per se! However once a product/ commodity/ substance is known to be carcinogenic than its further use in any wider application becomes dangerous and unlikely! As a consequence further use even in a limited capacity, becomes equally inadvisable!

 

[peterjg]

Thank you for all your replies, I did not expect such a response. One certain thing with fishing there is never a definative answer!

My shop had sold out of white maggots so I bought some bronze ones instead, a colour that I had not used for many years. It appears that red maggots are more popular than white ones but I have had better results with white maggots (for roach). Admittedly I rarely use maggots prefering flavoured bread but in view of your answers I will not buy bronze.


Two more questions:

Both red and bronze maggots are smaller than the white ones, why is that?

When I was a kid they were called 'gentles' never 'maggots', where does the name 'gentles' come from?

 

[David Rogers 3]

When I was a kid they were called 'gentles' never 'maggots', where does the name 'gentles' come from?

Anglers clinging to the language of Isaac Walton, maybe?

gentle2
NOUN

Fishing
A maggot, especially the larva of a blowfly, used as bait.
Example sentences
Origin
Late 16th century: probably from an obsolete sense of the adjective, ‘soft, pliant’.

gentle | Definition of gentle in English by Oxford Dictionaries

 

[peterjg]

David Rogers 3: I think that you have found the answer - it sounds right to me, thanks. I wish that they were still called gentles instead of the horrible sounding maggots.

 

[mikench]

Being somewhat contrary I have bought some bronze gentles to supplement the red and white I have! I do hope those grayling and Chub like what's on offer!

 

[peterjg]

Mikench: how nice (and proper) to see the term 'gentles' used instead of maggots. No harm in being a bit traditional, and even old fashioned!

We ought to start on here a campaign to bring back into everyday use the term 'gentles', the moderators should be most vigilant. I think I'll also try to get my grown-up kids to stop referring to me as the 'Grumpy Old Git'!

 

[peter crabtree]

Wagg and gentle doesn't sound right. Imagine going into a tackle shop and asking for a gentle feeder, or asking a female member of staff if she has a gentle box?

 

[peterjg]

Peter Crabtree: are you still fishing with PK, if you are that explains all, he is at best uncouth (only joking)!

 

[peter crabtree]

Yes I am Peter, this was 2 weeks ago.

Hope seeing this image doesn't ruin your day....

 

[peterjg]

Peter Crabtree: that really is a horrible sight, never do it again!!!! I've known PK since the 80s, he used to come right up to me and say "I can't believe that you are younger than me, etc, etc!" - I always called him a "lanky German streek of p!ss - we got on quite well.

He once hand lined in for me a 42lb carp which I had accidentally foul hooked, I got cut off and my line had got caught around his! Only a few minutes earlier I had accidentally foul hooked a 38lb carp! Happy days!? I' m sure that he will remember.

 

[mikench]

Maggot is a horrible word and has perjorative undertones! I have yet to see a female assistant in any tackle shop I have visited and in a few I would persist with maggots and the odd expletive

I would happily explain what a gentle box was if asked!

 

[markcw]

Mike, if you get up this way, my local tackle shop has a member of the England Ladies Team there, and I think if you asked her about a gentle box. she would give you a box around the ears, Only joking she can have a laugh like the rest of us,

 

[peter crabtree]

Try asking her if she has red gentles?

 

[mikench]

Try asking her if she has red gentles?

Before or after?