Caster conundrum

[Troydog]

Thank you gentlemen. In answer to OMR I do mix old casters and dead maggots left after riddling with ground bait, but my ground bait is pretty solid stuff. Its base is Herefordshire soil and bread crumb, mixed with red worms, hemp, a few casters and maggots. At this time of year, with twelve feet of water, I think that most of the fish are pretty close to the river bed. It's designed to sink pretty quickly and although it must break up on the river bed I'm not particularly bothered about a few casters floating upwards. After all, when I hold my float back periodically, my bait does the same.

It may well be different in the warmer months when the water is shallower and clearer.

[Catfish.017]

With a couple of pints of maggots in the bottom of my garage fridge I know that it would be a high-risk strategy to smuggle them into the caravan before we set off for France this weekend.
I have always restricted my holiday baits to things like hemp, tares and sweetcorn which have a sound behavioural track record.
So, these last few days I’ve been turning the bait into 100 gram bags of casters which will stay in the freezer until we are back in August. Before use I will drop them into a pail of water to skim off the floaters.
Point is that because the bait is now dead, sinkers should stay as sinkers on the river bank. So why don’t we always freeze casters to stop them turning during use?

Have you ever tried putting live but cold maggots from the fridge into plastic bags, gently squeezing out as much air as possible, sealing the bags and placing them in a chiller bag with a few freezer blocks? The go dormant and my experience is that they will last 48+ hours like that. At the other end of the journey, open the bags and put the maggots in a wide bowl and most of them will wake up. Box them and put them in a fridge.

I used to have to buy maggots mail order and this was how they were transported from maggot farm to me during the summer months.

I remember back in the late Sixties Don bait company would send a tin of maggots in sawdust by rail to your nearest station!

[Match Aerial]

Here's what I do with casters:

When I get home I put any remaining casters in a freezer bag. I then add about tablespoon of a flavour to the bag, trap a bit of air in the bag and give it a good shake to coat the casters, squeeze the air out, tie the top and place in the freezer. I found that if frozen dry some of the casters split and I had to spend a bit of time sorting them to use on a hook. Adding a flavour seems to prevent this and also slow down the "going black". Pretty much any flavour that you can buy in a tackle shop will do, but don't use the expensive boilie ones as it becomes a bit costly. Thai fish sauce that you can buy in supermarkets works well, as do the Sensas flavours and The Source. When I next go fishing I just take the casters out the night before and put in a cool bag. I then just use as fresh casters.


Maggots will keep really well as follows:

Riddle off any maize or sawdust, place the maggots in a freezer bag and squeeze out as much air as you can. Pop the bag in the fridge or in a cool box with some ice packs. Every 24 hours open the freezer bag and give the maggots a good shake then leave the bag open for about 10 minutes before squeezing out the air sealing and placing back in the cold. I've kept them for over a week like this, even in hot weather.

I freeze any left over maggots when I get home. Generally I use the method recommended by Archie Braddock which is to riddle off any maize or sawdust, place in a freezer bag with a glug of flavour, shake the bag to coat the maggots, squeeze out any air, seal and freeze.

Hope that helps!

I will have to try that one Sean, I did not have much sucess with the other method. They were ok if you use them within a few hours but after that they still turned black.. Would cake favouring work Sean with your method on casters ?

[Troydog]

Mind you, Ivan Marks, the late great match fisherman always chose 'blacks' for his hookbait. I'll post an extract from Ivan Marks on Match Fishing in a few minutes. It'll be a new post because I don't think this thread accepts photos.

[SeanM]

Here's what I do with casters:

When I get home I put any remaining casters in a freezer bag. I then add about tablespoon of a flavour to the bag, trap a bit of air in the bag and give it a good shake to coat the casters, squeeze the air out, tie the top and place in the freezer. I found that if frozen dry some of the casters split and I had to spend a bit of time sorting them to use on a hook. Adding a flavour seems to prevent this and also slow down the "going black". Pretty much any flavour that you can buy in a tackle shop will do, but don't use the expensive boilie ones as it becomes a bit costly. Thai fish sauce that you can buy in supermarkets works well, as do the Sensas flavours and The Source. When I next go fishing I just take the casters out the night before and put in a cool bag. I then just use as fresh casters.


Maggots will keep really well as follows:

Riddle off any maize or sawdust, place the maggots in a freezer bag and squeeze out as much air as you can. Pop the bag in the fridge or in a cool box with some ice packs. Every 24 hours open the freezer bag and give the maggots a good shake then leave the bag open for about 10 minutes before squeezing out the air sealing and placing back in the cold. I've kept them for over a week like this, even in hot weather.

I freeze any left over maggots when I get home. Generally I use the method recommended by Archie Braddock which is to riddle off any maize or sawdust, place in a freezer bag with a glug of flavour, shake the bag to coat the maggots, squeeze out any air, seal and freeze.

Hope that helps!

I will have to try that one Sean, I did not have much sucess with the other method. They were ok if you use them within a few hours but after that they still turned black.. Would cake favouring work Sean with your method on casters ?

It will work, but the bottles are a bit small so you'd need nearly a whole bottle. The Sensas flavours and similar are only a few quid for 500ml in most tackle shops and they will last a few years. The scopex one works well.

[SeanM]

Mind you, Ivan Marks, the late great match fisherman always chose 'blacks' for his hookbait. I'll post an extract from Ivan Marks on Match Fishing in a few minutes. It'll be a new post because I don't think this thread accepts photos.

The black ones that Ivan was referring to were the ones that were just about to turn. These are very buoyant and counteract the weight of the hook, giving a more natural fall through the water.

[Troydog]

You are absolutely right SeanM, but now I found that paragraph - Ive dived into the rest of the book. Some great stuff in it. Meanwhile temperature is rising and the ice in the margins is starting to melt. The Wye is 3.4 deg C today - weather forecast suggests it may go up one degree per day til Friday - pleased to see my maggots turning......

[Troydog]

You are absolutely right SeanM, but now I found that paragraph - Ive dived into the rest of the book. Some great stuff in it. Meanwhile temperature is rising and the ice in the margins is starting to melt. The Wye is 3.4 deg C today - weather forecast suggests it may go up one degree per day til Friday - pleased to see my maggots turning......