Pike Attractants

[Andy Macfarlane]

Some of my past thoughts on the subject..

 

"Get an old tin with a tight fitting lid and pierce it as many times as you can be bothered and attach it to a rope for retrieval purposes.

Fill it with chopped oily fish etc. and throw it into your chosen eel swim. Leave it there overnight preferably but it will also work if you plan a long day session."

 

"Winterized Salmon Oil and Van Den Eynde Liquid Pellet (I suspect it's Halibut extract) are both very good additives.

Don't get the VDE Predator Plus. It doesn't seem to increase runs from Pike. In fact I'd even go as far as to say, it's a deterrent. It's the greatest Eel attractor ever made though but that wasn't the question."

 

"So a little oil escapes to the surface.

Theres a lot more to oil than the stuff you see on the surface. You try injecting a bait with aniseed. Give it an hour in the drink and reel it in. It might not feel oily anymore but it definitely stinks like a sweet shop. The oil has left some sort of distinct odour behind. I'm pretty sure if we had better senses we would realise that all oils leave a residual odour. Why bother using oily baits if the oil is of no benefit??

Other than regular injected deads, I use swim feeders filled with oil soaked cotton wool in place of weights on occasion. Once these smelly articles have been reused and re injected a few times, the cotton takes on a sticky, jammy appearance and it stinks to high heaven. Again, very distinct after a soaking.

I know perfectly well that plain baits work and they work well but you have to concede that sometimes the pike need a helping hand finding baits in the dark, peaty/murky water and in rough terrain where baits may not be visible.

Sometimes they just need the extra incentive to get up and investigate an odour. It certainly does no harm to try.

Some folk reckon pop-ups help the pike find their baits. I reckon my aniseed flavoured trout is a hell of a lot more noticeable than a plain roach. If I can smell the difference, I'm 99% certain the pike can too.

Here's a thing. You rub your hands with some mackerel oil. Now wash your hands in cold water. No soap mind! Do your hands still smell even though they look clean??"

 

"I sometimes swap my lead for a swimfeeder filled with cotton wool. The cotton wool is injected with oils and cast as normal. Once the feeder has been used a few times, the cotton takes on a permanent odour and the older it gets the better it seems to work. It just needs a small squirt every now and again to refresh the scent. I keep the feeders in grip-bags.

Smelt deadbaits and Smelt laced feeders work really well."

 

There's more but I'm way too lazy to search for them...

[didi]

i live near dartford ,my local tackle shop sells oil called ( mighty ming oil ) please beleive me it mings i pour this over my dead baits and in there mouths before i cast out. when you have cast you can see an oil slick come to the surface, i find this works very well once them pike come across a drifting slick the follow it all the way home tryed and tested with good results ( MIGHTY MING OIL ) tackle box dartford kent

[slodger]

Okay, my twopennorth.

 

I don't bother with oils or attractors, on the subject of oils I'm an agnostic..

 

What I do, and seem to get results on, is to puree dead fish in a blender. I use about two parts of the resulting paste with one part of liquidised liver and a tube of anchovy paste. It's important to get the consistency of the blended fish as smoothas possible. A decent blender will render it as fine as toothpaste. Like this it has three distinct advantages:

It dissapates as a fine cloud of scent and taste,

There are no fragments of bone or sinew that might mask a hook point,

and it doesn't actually offer the pike in your swim anything tangible to 'feed themselves off on'.

 

I simply spread a layer of it over my dead-bait with a plastic spatula. If you want it to hang on a little longer, i.e for a harder cast, or in strong flows, then a quick blast from a can of plumbers freezing spray firms it up nicely.

 

It's caught me quite a few pike, and once or twice I've caught when mates haven't. Of course there's no way of proving that it's helped, but I'm pretty confident. It really comes into it's own on rivers, especially when there's some colour.

[GlennB]

i live near dartford ,my local tackle shop sells oil called ( mighty ming oil ) please beleive me it mings...

 

 

Gotta try this on Sunday. Might have to invent my own mingin' mix in the meantime.

[Andy Macfarlane]

Chris....did you know Chappie dogfood is 70% fish....apparently? We used to paste some of that stuff onto deabaits and it seemed to work alright.

[Melvin]

Slightly away from the topic but what Needle to you prefer to use, i had two tackle shop bought biggies and the rubber has expanded on the plungers and stopped them from working.

 

i assume that the rubber took on the oil and expanded.

 

any brand suggestions ?

[Sportsman]

Instead of a ledger I use a swimfeeder filled with chopped sardine. Not sure if it works or not but it makes me feel happier that I am doing something positive

[Peter Waller]

There has to be a market for a fish-oil dispenser that the angler can clip to their line.

 

Sea anglers that I know fix phials of UltaBite to their line with, they believe, great success.

 

Despite that, and talking to people involved with UltraBite, there is not, unless someone can tell me otherwise, a commercial dispenser of liquid attractants.

[Crackin Clax]

went down the tackle shop today to find that they are doing a special pike fishing bait deal. 10 spras, 3 joey mackerals, 5 roach for £2.50. I though this was such a bargain i bought 5 pike packs and am going to save them until i need them !!

[slodger]

'Chris....did you know Chappie dogfood is 70% fish....apparently?'

 

I had an idea Andy, I used to feed my mutt on it. The vet reccomended it as being as good as anything else on the market and twice as cheap as most. It smells like a Kipper's Slippers!

 

I'd imagine anything bloody/fishy/meaty would have an attractive scent to pike.