Egg cures?

[scales]

I saw someone was asking about cures. I to have a question for the expert egger. No matter what cure I use or how I do it I get 1 or 2 casts per bait then the membrane breaks down and I loose my bait. Anyone know what might be causing this? Maybe a step by step guide from someone who has good luck with curing would be helpful. Any advice would be greatly appreiciated.

[THE REEL HEY_YALL]

I don't know anything about cures so I am not an expert, but I do know some advice to give ya. Wrap your bait with that "magic thread" stuff. It's stretchy nylon string that you wrap around your bait. It helps keep your bait on the hook, thus giving you more casts. hope it works.
roll tide

[Grant Scheele]

Are you using an egg loop knot when you tie on your hook? When I have eggs like you describe either I started with really cruddy (over mature) eggs or I over cured them. To many chems left on for to long will break down the membrane. Try to keep your eggs frozen when you are not using them. Draining the eggs of excess juice will slow down the curing process. Many cures never stop curing but the freezer will slow down the process. I have also found that if I cure the eggs in larger chunks and cut into bait size chunks while fishing the membrane will stay intact longer. Good luck.

[cureless]

Its hard to tell exactly what is going on but dry the eggs out a little before you put any cure on them and then follow the cure instruction as listed exactly, then they should be a little tacky when your done and ready to freeze them.

Good luck

Cureless

[Bait O' Eggs]

This might be obvious as h*ll to all, but I havent seen it on the BB. Cut your skein into baits with scissors. It is difficult to pop the eggs with a pair of scissors. Especially when the eggs are mature chinook eggs and the size of peas. I see people cutting there eggs with a knife all the time and it pops a lot of the eggs. Might be alright to use a knife if you want the eggs to milk faster.

[This message has been edited by Bait O' Eggs (edited 09-07-2000).]

[Chrome Bright]

Scales-
I agree with O.Mykiss about leaving the cure on too long. The membranes do tend to break down. I cure my eggs with different mixes of cures, but always follow the time guidelines for "cooking" them, and they turn out really nice. Bob Ball has a great recipe for eggs in the archive section (www.piscatorialpursuits.com). I have tried his recipe, and the eggs turn out great - a little rubbery, which helps I think, too.

By the way, hello to all - this is my first post on this board. I'm "fishrmn" on Bob's board.

Looking forward to learning and sharing as much as I can! - Mark.

[STRIKE ZONE]

Welcome to the board CHROME-BRIGHT,As far as cures for egg's I have great result's with this cure.Pro-cure double red,What I do is take the skeins of egg's rinse them off in cool water really fast,Lay on paper towels pat dry with more paper towels.Take a gallon sized freezer zip lock and put a little cure in the bottom of bag,Lay one skein in,then add more cure,put a nother skein in with more on top of that and so on.Once you have layered your egg's and cure in bag about half full zip bag shut and shake and rub egg's to blend cure with egg's and juices.Put in frid leave a lone for about two or three hours.By this time they will have juiced up nicely,take out of frig and shake and rub around for about three to five minutes,Place back in frid between side and a gallon of milk so that bag stay's up right so that all egg's are some what in the juices.Wake up in the morning and repeat shake and rub process before going to work.When you get home take egg's out of cure and place them on a window screen,non metal,use vinyl screen.Put in shed or garage,some where that is cool and out of a cat's reach.Let dry over night,then after work take egg's off of screen,cut up skein's to correct size for your liking.Roll baits in borax shake off excess,place in freezer containers like the one's grandma used for freezing berry's for the winter.I place a layer of paper towels between each layer of baits usually three to four layer's I don't pack in tight so they get smashed.Then a couple day's before I go fishin I take out a container let thaw in fride or on counter top,check out egg drynees and texter if the egg's are to soft and juicy I rollthem in borax one more time and let stand for about an hour then put backin container,some times I just grab a container and head for the river.It all depends on your taste for firmness and texter though some what time consuming these egg's have produced great result's in both fall salmon and winter/summer steelhead fishing in washington and oregon.I always label container's with cure color kind of eggs and year caught.Like this, double red/Bouy-10/King egg's "2000". STRIKE ZONE

[scales]

That was a great descriptive method Strike Zone. I will try your method next time and see how it works out. Course that means I will have to take a day off from chasing elk around the woods to go catch a fish or two. Dang Elk are to crafty so far this year anyways. Thanks for the input.
Scales

[Bobber Down]

I just had a friend call me and ask me how to cure some eggs that been packed in salt and stored at room temp. I guess that these were got in Alaska and packed in salt for about one year. Is there any hope for these eggs to be cured, and if there is, how would you go about cureing them? Thanks