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Carp Bait: Treat a carp to
its Favourite Meal
A carp is an intelligent fish and it also has a memory. It knows what’s good and
what’s not edible. Carp may test the food’s nutritional content, its taste
or to determine if it has gone off. It may reject bait because it remembers
that a particular substance or smell was previously accompanied by a hook.
Like all creatures, carp have
daily nutritional requirements for vitamins, minerals, proteins, amino acids
(lysine and methionine), carbohydrates, oil and fibre. Carp can smell amino
acids emitted by bloodworms, crayfish, and aquatic plants. Green-lipped
mussel extract, kelp extract, liver powder and molasses contain sucrose and
amino acids, which the carp has learned to recognise as having nutritional
value. Some anglers use peanuts. While peanuts contain lipids, sugars and
amino acids, these do not mimic the natural foods carp like.
Carp love boilies, bread
crust, meat baits, maize, fruity flavours (items containing vitamin C),
stilton cheese, white fishmeal (herring meal is very desirable to carp),
full fat soya flour, lactalbumin, rennet casein, robin red, hemp and seaweed
extract. The best items are those that either emit favourable smells or
contain ingredients which mimic them. Carp will also eat flavoured imitation
baits. When boilies fail to attract them, artificial corn will usually work.
Zoom Carp Snacks have been used successfully by many carp anglers. The
snacks come in honey, vanilla, strawberry and chocolate flavours.
What works one place at one time of the year will not necessarily work at
another or during a different season. Anglers often use easily digested
food/ingredients in bait during the winter because carp don't move much due
to the cold conditions. In the summer months, when fish are more active,
anglers should use more protein in their baits. Older carp, however, require
less protein.
Boilies
There are shelf life boilies
and there are the homemade varieties. Generally, if you make your own
boilies they should work out cheaper and if done correctly, some anglers
swear, more effective. You must make up your own mind on which is best for
you and your situation.
At the time of writing, Mainline makes boilies in several different flavours
that are attractive to carp. These include Strawberry Jam, Sweet Pineapple,
Tiger Nut, Tutti-Frutti, and Halibut. The 18mm versions are designed to
catch in all fishing situations. Newfields makes Fire and Ice (F&I) boilies.
They are a blend of marine proteins, milk protein, vegetable extracts, kelp,
belachan block, hot chilli powder, spices and betaine. F&I boilies are
available in 14-24mm sizes. They are designed for year round usage and are
especially valuable in the cold winter months.
Making a boilie at home is akin to making a cake. You mix 6-10 eggs;
flavours and additives; liquids; maize, corn semolina, soy flours; powdered
milk and sugar to form a paste. Almond essence, liver flavour, anchovy
concentrate, squid, octopus, amino acids, peach and pepper flavours, betaine,
shellfish, plum, fruit, green lipped mussel, red salmon oil and curry powder
are particularly effective additives. The mixture is rolled into a ball,
placed into a fry basket and then boiled for 1-3 minutes. The finished
boilies are dried on paper for 2-3 days. They are now ready to use or they
can be stored in the freezer.
There are various types of
boilies depending on the materials used. High Nutritional Value (HNV)
boilies incorporate a range of ingredients that benefit the fish in some
way. A typical HNV mix will include digestible or predigested casein's,
proteins, vitamins and minerals. An angler making his own boilies can add
other flavours, colours, and enhancers. The drawback to HNV baits is that
they are expensive. Best results using HNV boilies are achieved from June to
November. High Attract
(HA) boilies are generally buoyant. They are normally used as a single hook
bait (no free offerings around the hook bait). The HA boilies are over
flavoured, producing a brightly coloured bait that stands out from the lake
bed. The high level of attraction is produced with the aid of a bait dip,
soak or glug. The baits are very effective all year round, but especially so
during the really cold winter months when the carp don’t want to get their
heads down to feed.
Soluble boilies are not used to place the hook in the carp’s mouth. Instead,
they dissolve and form a particle layer on the bottom with an intense scent
that cause the carps to investigate. They have delicious flavors, usually
wheat, maize, or cinnamon amongst others. The soluble boilies are made
without eggs. The flours, including portions of salt or sugar, are mixed
with water or with milk. The boilies are not cooked and left to air dry.
Non-soluble pellets are made the same as regular boilies. Instead of being
rolled into balls, they are formed into long cylinders, cut into sections,
cooked in water, and dried on paper.
Particle baits
Particles refer to seeds,
nuts and grains that are used as either hook bait or groundbait. The best
known and most widely used is maize. It makes a great bait after soaking and
boiling. Tiger nuts are brown nuts with a very rough texture. They are one
of the hardest particles around and must soak for 24 hours before being
boiled for 30 minutes. The prepared nuts are best when left in the water for
2-3 days after boiling. The water is turned milky white due to sugars in the
nuts. Two nuts on a hair rig are excellent as a bottom bait. To make a
pop-up (buoyant bait), sandwich a piece of cork shaped like a nut between
two nuts on a hair rig. Other particle baits include hemp, hempseed, maple
peas, and lupins. Flavorings, dips and additives make particle baits more
attractive to carp. One of the best commercial particle baits is
WackerBlendPlus.
Groundbaits
Groundbait is made from
different kinds of natural ingredients such as bread crumbs, hemp, walnut
flour and so on. It is moistened with water, formed into balls and thrown
into the water where you plan to fish. The carp are attracted to the smell
and clouding of the water. One of the best types of groundbait is made by
van den Eynde.
Live baits
The diet of small carp
includes black midges and animals without backbones ½ millimeter+ long (the
size of a pencil dot). These animals live on rocks, logs, sediment, debris
and aquatic plants during some phase of their life. They include crayfish,
clams, snails, aquatic worms and the immature forms of aquatic insects, such
as stonefly and mayfly nymphs.
The adult carps are omnivores, and their diet includes molluscs, water
fleas, aquatic crustaceans, sea lice, lawn shrimp, beach flees, aquatic and
terrestrial insects, detritus, seeds, fragments of dead aquatic plants and
filamentous algae
There are a number of live
baits that you use to catch carp. These are the same creatures that carp
would find in the water. Mainline makes bloodworm extract stik pellets,
which easily break down and draw carp to your baiting area. Dynamite Baits
makes fishmeal boilies containing flavours that carp like, such as crab,
shrimp, octopus, halibut, oyster, and chicken.
References
Anonymous. No date given. How to Make Boilies.
URL:
http://www.geocities.com/diabolo38/bouille.html [Accessed
April 1 2007].
--------------. No date given. Tiger Nuts.
URL:
http://www.geocities.com/secarping/nuts.html [Accessed April
1 2007].
Carpman, James. No date given. Boilie Baits.
URL:
http://www.geocities.com/jstevens_uk/bait_boilies.htm
[Accessed April 1 2007].
Newfields Bait Supplies. April 2007. Fire and Ice Basemix and Rolled Baits!
URL:
http://www.geocities.com/newfieldsbaits/nbs.htm [Accessed
April 1 2007].
Related Links:
Catching
Bigger Carp through a Baiting Campaign
Baiting up for long carp fishing sessions
Carp
Senses; taste, smell & vision
The Digestive Habits of Carp & What it means for Bait
List
of all our Carp Fishing Articles & Information
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