The Traditional Fisherman's Forum

One thought from me; elderberry make an excellent alternative bait that hooks perfectly. You can gather in season and preserve.

As Moley and JAA have said, it IS possible to hook hemp through the shell, but you do need hooks with very strong points (thanks for the specific recommendations, Moley, I'll try some myself!) and you need to keep checking them, because hemp shells will blunt them in the end.
Cross-feeding with other baits has fans and detractors, but one complication (among many) is that if you try and feed mixed particles with throwing-stick or catapult, they'll separate out in the air - tares, for instance, fly further than hemp - so you can end up feeding two different lines without realising it. The longer the range, the more it matters; better to feed one then the other.
By the way, sliding floats make for a faster, quieter strike.

Inspired by this thread I went close range trotting for roach last night, using a mix of hemp and tares that I had prepared by boiling together. Needless to say that the roach responded with their usual vigour and I caught plenty. I tried both hemp and tares as hook bait, and found tares was far more successful, mainly because hemp didn't hold firm enough to survive more than one bite, whereas if I missed a bite with tares I had confidence to continue the trot. Also, the tares bites were more confident!