Have been saving fish roe in the freezer for future use. Does anyone know how to convert the egg skeins into usable bait?? The wife wants to know what I'm ging to do with them. I'm thinkin that means "use'em or loose'em.
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First, what kind of roe is it? Salmon, steelhead...? If you were going to use this roe for bait, you are never supposed to freeze it before you cure it. Always cure it when its very fresh, and remember, Steelhead don't like sulfite cures, and Salmon love them. Atlas makes a good one for Salmon, and Pautzke makes a good one for Steelhead. You could still try to thaw it out and cure it I guess, just don't know if will turn out ok.
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If you froze it before you cured it is probably ruined.
P.m. me for instructions on a quick easy do it yourself method that I use.
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I just took a stab at curing some steelhead roe up with borax. If you search the net there are quite a few recipes and it was really quite simple. If you plan on cutting up the skeins I offer two words of advice - rubber gloves. I just tried plain old borax and hope to try them on chinook this summer. I think they looked "pretty good" when I put them in the freezer but I have nothing to compare them to. Only time will tell
Just curious - anyone ever try them for plain old trout fishing?
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I don't precure my salmon and steelhead skeins prior to freezing. I loosely vacuum pack them and freeze. When I'm ready to use I slow thaw in the fridge.
I love "egg balls" for both salmon and steelhead. I cut and lay out 3"x3" mesh squares and cut the eggs onto the mesh. Size depends on whether I'm using for salmon or steelies. Nickel to quarter size for salmon, dime sized for steelhead. After eggs are cut, I use "magic thread" to finish by folding the corners together to form the ball, and make a few wraps with the thread, cinch, a few more wraps and break off. Use scissors to trim the tag. After a few minutes on a strainer to let excess juice drain off, I roll the egg balls in Pro Cure, let 'em sit overnight and they're ready to fish.
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freezing uncured eggs is absolutely fine!! just make sure you vacuum seal them. i do it all the time and produce an excellent final product. in fact, i have about 10# of frozen roe left from the puget sound fishing last summer. just waiting for our salmon season. used some for steelhead and they were great.
guess what, if you buy uncured roe from the wholesale outfits online, guess how they come....thats right, frozen!!
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Thanks for the replies. Thinkin about using roe balls for the reservoirs in eastern idaho when the trout are deep. Without a downrigger its harder to get down to em. Will try it and see and report back.
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During springer season last year after the jacks stole all my own steelhead and salmon roe, I had to buy frozen coho roe and I found thawing them in a heavy brine of sulfite & seasalt based cure toughened up the skiens enough to stay on a hook quite awhile, but let them milk well too!
We started using sodiumbimetasulphate and amino acids plus some other secret stuff and WOW did that help a ton
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I took a stab at it with some [url "http://www.bigfishtackle.com/cgi-bin/gforum/gforum.cgi?post=700025"]Trout roe[/url] (post). After a bit of digging for recipes (see text file - basic recipe), then turned to trying some commercial curing mix too.
I picked up a sack-tying rig. It's not necessary, but really does facilitate the stuffing and wrapping effort. Expect to try it with some catfish baits too - nasty chicken livers!
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Also figured if the cure works on eggs, why not on minnows? Now I've got purple perchlings froze up too!
BlueBoy posted a[url "http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xo2NmIbMEPk&feature=related"] link to a Youtube vid[/url] too.
Maybe this year I can get up north for some of that Salmon action! Of course I could do without the combat fishing!
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Ok, can't resist. If you don't wanna give up all that Roe to the fishes, you can try something like this to prep them for "other" purposes!
[center][url "http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u7e-Y19uJA&feature=related"]Soy Sauce Salmon Roe[/url]
[left]And don't fret the fact that the titles has all kinds of Chinese characters - there's subtitles! [:p]
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Sweet, a pic of the Kenai River crowd below the Russian. When folks say we have "combat fishing" here in Idaho, they have no idea...
Be careful with sodium sulfite, as it can "burn" your eggs...
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yeah that puts combat fishing in to perspective. we do have it easy here.
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A friend and I went looking around Alaska after we got our caribou. We saw a bunch of fishermen at the mouth of a little river, all in chest waders in a tiny group. One crazy guy with only hip boots was 20 yards closer to shore and was actually casting between the chest waders to get to good water. He constantly was tangling up on them then would start saying, a little help? A little help? The guys were muttering and finally one turned and said buddy, we are gonna cut you up for bait. Everybody else agreed and he took the hint.
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Ideally the best thing to do IMO is to take your cure of choice fishing with you that way at the end of the day you can take your eggs that have been kept in a cool dry place and start the curing process immediately. Remember to always bleed your fish right after you bonk them that way you not only improve the meat quality but you also get most if not all the blood out of your skeins. By immediately curing your eggs you can have top quality eggs that are ready to fish or freeze the next day. Freezing uncured eggs is not necessarily they best way as it creates cracks in the egg membrane but as huntsman stated if you slowly thaw them you will still have fishable eggs.
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