Back up bait for blackfish

[Volitan]

Sometimes it’s not possible to get weed around here.

is there some type of vegetable food that will do as a substitute. I can’t help thinking there must be something in our refrigerators that will fool a blackfish ?

i know it’s not carrot - I tried that after reading it on one website.

i read frozen peas do the trick on another website, haven’t tried them yet

i haven’t had much success with bread (another website)

and I know they will take the odd peeled prawn etc in some places but around here it’s pretty rare.

ive caught a few on weed flies too, but only once I’ve already got them feeding on weed.

so any ideas on some type of backup bait of the vegetable type?

cheers

V.

 

Edited June 24, 2018 by Volitan

[wazatherfisherman]

G'day Volitan over the years I've tried different vege's looking for a useable substitute for weed with no success. Didn't think to try the peas though. I've often wondered if any of the greens available in Asian supermarkets would be worth a try. I listed my alternative baits under the topic of "Night time Luderick and Surgeons" by Fishraider Kracka

[Pafisho08]

Hi Voltan 

Have you checked out the rock pools at the end of the beaches as they hold fine hair weed at times and is good bait for blackies  in river or lakes .

Bob

[masterfisho7]

I also had tried greens and got nothing when no weed I use a green weed fly 

[rickmarlin62]

I use cabbage weed off the ocean rocks  in the lake up here all the time  fold it into small long skinny baits  works for me   i havent used string weed fir years

[PaddyT]

Used to fish for blackies in Narrabeen Lake when i was a teenager a lot, there used to be a picket line of "old blokes" there all winter who used to fish with string weed exclusively and tended to be very secretive about where to get it, what we discovered was that if we rocked up with a bucket of cabbage weed and berleyed hard we could get the blackies to switch to cabbage - this of course made us fairly unpopular with the fishos with string weed- berley is very effective on blackies.

[connico]

Tried frozen peas the other day and it worked ok. I think canned peas would be better as the frozen ones didn't last on the hook very long. Would come off very quickly

I use weed fly hooks most of the time when I cannot find blackfish. Hit rate is definitely lower for me...

 

[Volitan]

Thanks for the replies.

the thing about blackfishing is it’s a pleasant occupation where I can just walk along the road at a moments notice and be in a top spot. I don’t want to make it a major expedition with a bait collecting trip first. If the surfs up and I can’t get onto the local beach headlands then there really isn’t anywhere around here I know of to get weed - short of driving over to Pearl Beach.

So another thing I was wondering about is whether it’s possible to preserve weed. 

I tried freezing it once. It went horrible. But perhaps it would work if you had one of those vacuum sealer things as you would be preventing the freezer burn.

i also wondered about drying it. We have one of those Sunbeam electric food dehydrators that I ocassionaly use to make sundried tomatoes or whatever. I wonder whether you could dry one of the weed species and reconstitute it - or maybe just use it dry as it would reconstitute in the water to a degree. Sometimes dried foods are much more intense then fresh, because the flavour has been concentrated.

Final thing. Years ago I used to have a saltwater aquarium. There was a big foxface (rabbit fish thing) that ate cabbage weed. I used to pick the cabbage weed and seal it up in plastic soft drink bottles full of seawater, and leave them on the verandah. The weed used to live for months. It went pretty yellow - the fish ate it but then aquarium fish don’t really have choices.

if any of these work out, I’ll post.

 

 

[Volitan]

4 hours ago, connico said:

Tried frozen peas the other day and it worked ok. I think canned peas would be better as the frozen ones didn't last on the hook very long. Would come off very quickly

I use weed fly hooks most of the time when I cannot find blackfish. Hit rate is definitely lower for me...

 

On the weed flies. Where I chase the blackfish they’re not actively feeding, more just loafing around the wharf waiting for the tide to come in so they can spread out over the flats scrounging weed. There is absolutely no natural food around the wharf, so I guess they are there for the shelter. I usually have to burley for a while to get them interested in feeding. It typically takes about 15 mins of berleying till the first down. When they’re excited, they’ll take a weed fly, but only once or twice. After that they seem to understand the need to be cautious and won’t touch the fly. They will continue to take real weed.

In a zone where they are actively feeding it might be quite different.

[Captain Spanner]

I might be wrong but it was my understanding that the blackfish ate the weed because of all of the tiny little organisms that live in it and not for the weed itself. So using a clean dry vegetable from a garden might not be going down the right path. I think when the guys keep the weed they pad the water out of it with a towel or paper and place it betwene layers of newspaper in a cool dark spot under the house. I assumed this was to keep the little animals alive. Freezing ti would kill everything. If you put a good clump of the stringy weed on some news paper you will see all of the little lice and animals crawl out onto the paper. 

[blindmullet]

You can preserve string/hair weed for about 4 weeks. Lightly wring out the weed then spread evenly on newspaper and cover then pat it down very gently just so the newspaper is touching the weed top and bottom. I leave it overnight then put it in a ice cream container without any newspaper. Usually lasts about 4 weeks but longer wouldnt surprise me

[Pafisho08]

I have frozen some of the fine clean weed from tidal creeks and the weed from rock pools . I have found if you dry it out as much as possible  and place it in thin layers into cliplock bags and place into your bait freezer .But do not rinse with any water at any time .I have some frozen which is 2 yrs old and it is like the day I got it and it catches fish --So give it ago  

Bob

[Volitan]

19 hours ago, Pafisho08 said:

I have frozen some of the fine clean weed from tidal creeks and the weed from rock pools . I have found if you dry it out as much as possible  and place it in thin layers into cliplock bags and place into your bait freezer .But do not rinse with any water at any time .I have some frozen which is 2 yrs old and it is like the day I got it and it catches fish --So give it ago  

Bob

I’ll give it another go.

thinking about it, if I wanted to refine the process a bit then I could snap freeze it. ie put a heavy iron pan in the freezer for a day or two till it’s chilled through. Open the freezer door, drop the weed on the pan so that as much as possible makes direct contact, leave for a few minutes then bag. The idea being that the cold iron sucks any warmth out of the weed and freezes it immediately, thus preventing ice crystals building up within the weed which is what breaks down the cellular walls and can turn it into mush. May not be necessary, so I will try it both ways.

 

cheers

V.

[Rebel]

Green peas to the rescue.

Love it

[Koalaboi]

I have frozen cabbage weed from the rocks and it has worked well when thawed.

KB