My experience of homemade boilies started when I was testing homemade base mixes; I had little experience but threw together some ingredients which appeared to work well together. Having managed to actually bind, roll and cook the ingredients without them falling apart, I took the bait to a runs water and along side my brother, began what I can now call a ‘commercial’ day session. I was confident in my baits and my brother was citing me against the performing Mainline ‘Cell’ boilies.
The test started slowly and neither of us were really getting ‘red letter’ results. This was initially put down to the weather and atmospherics. After a quick call to my now good friend Tim Richardson, he rocked up…and the magic happened. Change of tactics? Change of location? Change of rigs…no…change of bait. Tim suggested that my baits were okay…but that was it. Gutted but enthused.
Tim started to explain the dynamics of what the ingredients did and how they worked with each other. Deep conversation instigated a homemade bait testing day, first my baits, then Tim’s various homemade baits used, when Tim arrived with his baits. This instigated a cuppa and when the brew bag was broken open, Tim’s eyes popped out of his head; Biscuits and chocolate! Was he hungry? Had he succumbed to a tasty morsel of the classic fisherman’s overnight staple diet. No. Before the kettle had boiled I had crushed the baits (making them far more potent) into a PVA bag. First take was in 3 minutes. My brother Steve just shook his head saying “I don’t believe it.”
The good news is that I smashed the water. The not so good news is that the tea that I tried to make never actually got made and Tim went thirsty. No sooner had the tea bag hit the bottom of the cup when the alarm melted off. This was to be the case for the rest of my session until I had run out of Tim’s homemade bait on test and chocolate biscuits! The amount of carp caught is actually unknown, save to say it was a large number with the average weight between 5lb to 15lb.
Looking to the other side of the swim, my brother (using Mainline cell) had been converted and a PVA bag was being constructed using the same set up as me…albeit with crushed Cell boilie. He had the same experience but it was no way anything nearly as effective with his bait and the individual fish weights weren’t as big. Interesting.
After that ‘Eureka’ experience I pushed to learn more about ingredient and what stimulates carp to triggering them to hit your baits. I think it is fair to say that there is no magic answer and there never will be…you still have to angle well to catch. A home-grown bait which overpowers commercial baits will give you an upper hand and let’s face, it is dog eat dog on the bank.
A while later…after tweaking and refining and testing on different lakes (some easy and some difficult), I started to and see fantastic results! The results were so much better compared to commercial boilies and angling colleagues wanted to purchase my baits. I respectfully declined in the knowledge that I was going to make the most of my baits rather than the fish getting used to them by kilos being launched in by ‘commercial’ anglers.
In 2013 we both booked a trip to Gigantica, France, and each took 25kg each of my homemade delights. On our arrival we were excited but nervous hoping my bait works on a difficult and prolific lake. The draw was made and I was advised by the resident bailiff not to throw kilos and kilos of bait in. I wish some would listen…the guy next to me added 10kg per night. Furthermore, we dug deep after the bailiff said that homemade boilies just don’t work at the venue. We received a ‘good luck’ gesture.
The week was tough on all involved but this in the bailiffs report at the end of the week…
Weather – a calm start to the week with some sunny days changing to a very wet end to the week, Pressure – 1017, Water Temp – 18 degrees. Number of Anglers: 9, Number of Bites: 16, Fish Landed: 10.
“Steve fishing in Stockpond was off the mark on Sunday evening landing a 34.08lb common from the 21RL towards Oblivion from then on it was disaster after disaster Steve went on a run of losing 5 fish. After close inspection on his rigs he realized that with his lead clip system and the size of the swivel on the lead he wasn’t dumping the leads allowing the fish to stay deep and find refuge in the weed. With some alterations he managed to drop the lead immediately on the takes resulting in landing a further 3 out of 3 takes, fish of 22.08lb common, 25lb mirror and a 31lb mirror were landed. A massive well done for picking your head up and making the changes that were needed! Total carp landed – 4, number of bites 9.” (Although the fish weren’t landed, the bites were there and regular. Far more than anyone else on the lake.)
“Chris fishing in Pole had a hard week with no signs of fish but kept plugging away, by Thursday he had seen a few fish roll quite close in so on the Friday night he decided on 1 of his rods to this area, 10RL towards the stink produced his only fish of the week a 38.08lb mirror. Steve and his brother Chris were using his homemade special bait a very nice bait that he had put a lot of thought and time into making and the Gigantica carp loved it!”
So as you can see from report the week ended on a high with homemade baits on a tough lake with switched off fish and poor weather conditions. This boilie mix I still use and although sometimes I tweak it here and there, it has a solid baseline set of ingredients.
I do also enjoy taking this bait to a runs water several times a year during different seasonal conditions to see its performance of trigger frenzy feeding.
I hope this short write up inspires you like it does for me to learn more about ingredients, chemicals and what triggers fish to take your own bait. The satisfaction of landing a carp using your own homemade baits is far exciting than using a bag of boilies from a shop!
Be opened minded, don’t stick to one idea, don’t be frightened to try outside the box and the results will show! My brother and I haven’t bought commercial baits for many years now and have had lots of satisfaction in making very effective potent baits to suit our fishing!
“Tim Richardson, he rocked up…and the magic happened. Change of tactics? Change of location? Change of rigs…no…change of bait!”