Combating nuisance species……

Posted by Keith on October 18, 2009 under Carp and Coarse Fishing, Help and Tips | Be the First to Comment

Question: My local lake contains signal crayfish that strip my bait off in a few minutes, can you help????

sent in by Gavin Lewis of Whitney.

Thanks for your question Gavin.

This is becoming a more widespread problem across the UK as these pesky non-native signals find their way into our waterways.

If you’ve never seen one of these devils, they’re anything up to about 10-12″ in length and some have monstrous claws, perfectly capable of giving you a painful nip!

There are numerous items on the market which help to stop these pests from annihilating our baits…..

First off is an over sized shrink tube which can be shrunk around your hook baits.

These work fairly efficiently but I’m not convinced that this is the best method.

My chosen technique  is to air dry my baits for a week or so before I go fishing.

What this basically means is that I remove all the fresh/frozen baits from their packaging and allow them to defrost on a towel or a tray.

After they have defrosted I place them into a purpose made Air drying bag…..these are available at the shop for around a tenner.

Allow the baits to hang in the bag in a cool dry place…..airing cupboards are very good. Ensure to agitate the bag regularly so that dampness cannot build up between the baits.

You can also allow them to air dry on large trays for much bigger quantities of bait….but remember as above to agitate the baits regularly to stop moisture build up on the sides and bottom.

This should toughen up the baits considerably for your session, albeit they will still take in water and rehydrate once you start fishing. What we need to apply is a fine mesh skin to the baits to make things a bit tougher for the crayfish to work at.

If you visit a local haberdashery/sewing shop they will sell you a coloured fabric mesh which is brilliant for what we need.

You can purchase these is pretty much every colour of the rainbow and at around a £1 per sqr M they won’t crucify your bank balance either.

All that we need to do is place our chosen boilie into a section of the mesh and gather the mesh around the bait tightly.

Gather all of it up and pinch it between your finger and thumb.

Now twist the boilie to tighten the whole thing right up. Ensure that there are no ripples in the mesh as this will give the crayfish something to start working on.

Next, take some dental floss which again is available in many colour guesses and tie a good solid knot around the top of the mesh…..ensure it is tight enough to not allow the mesh to slip.

Gently cut away the excess mesh leaving just a few millimeters to work with.

Using a lighter, gently start to burn the tag end mesh with the flame and as it draws closer to the knot, stop the flame by placing the mesh against the lighters side, thus causing a flat edged blob.

This seals the whole thing and stops any slippage of the mesh through the knot.

The other cool thing is that once you have pulled your hair rig through the bait, you can loop the hair around the tagged blob and pull tight.

This gives a really solid bait stop inside the bait almost, thus away from the waiting claws!

I have in recent months also started to fish with double bottom baits covered in the mesh….this gives me even more time in the water.

I like to place a small rubber stopper above the baits to stop them from sliding on the hair.

This makes things just that bit more difficult for the crays to get into.

Just remember that this is not a total cure for the crayfish problem and that they will still manage to make their way through the baits…but this will add precious hours to the baits water life.

I manage to get 8-10 hours life from my baits. I would cast much more often than usual though on any water containing crayfish.

Although I have used bright baits for the above examples….I would suggest that the use of drab colours is more effective. Other tips would be to steer clear of oily pellets and fishmeal based hook baits as the crayfish will love these!

The other tips I have also found is that crayfish will tend to feed more on open gravel than in silt and a pop up tends to get nailed heavily too.

Tight Lines

Keith