Paste re-visited

[nicepix]

As some of you might remember I've been experimenting with making paste baits, largely unsuccessfully. I'm wanting to make a maize paste as maize is the single most successful bait out here and the main problem has been getting the right consistency. In cook's terms the dough has been too short.

Yesterday while boiling up some ground maize for particle feeding I had a Eureka moment. I had drained the maize after boiling and instead of draining it straight into the huge steel sink we have in the basement I left the sieve on top of a plastic bucket. Don't know why, but I did. When I came back to it to bag the maize grains I discovered a light grey slime in the bucket - starch! It had been released in the cooking process.

Today I've added a 50:50 mixture of fine maize groundbait and corn flour (maize flour) to the drained starch to make a paste, and it appears at this stage to be just the job. Plenty of elasticity and as it is made purely from maize should perfect to wrap maize grains in for added attraction and leakage.

 

[peter crabtree]

What are you expecting to catch with the paste and where?

 

[nicepix]

I'm looking to enhance the attraction of maize for carp in the lakes and barbel on rivers. Something to give the hook bait a lift and if and when it falls off I'll still have the maize on the hook.

 

[sumtime]

I'm a fan of paste, the other day halibut paste wrapped around 6mm pellets and sweet corn netted me quite a few pound of common, F1's, skimmers, roach and one golden tench, all taking the paste offering.

I'd also caught on bread and corn (forgot to take my luncheon meat) but the paste outfished them. I've been thinking of making some up myself since so the Internet has had a battering today. Fishmeal and Horlicks is some addition I'm thinking.