How do I cure salmon eggs?

[freshwater shark]

What is the easyest way to cure salmon eggs. I want to tie me own bags but dont know how to cure the roe.

[fishforfun]

Send Markus or Jammer a PM, don't think they bother curing. I used to do it with borax, but I'm pretty sure they just freeze the roe and thaw/tie as needed.

[joco]

HI frshwatershark


YOU could boiled them and put them in vinegar........


joco

[GreenBastard]

one of the most common cures i have seen was 8 cups of river water, 1 cup of non iodized, or pickling salt, and i cup of Borax. (optional one cup of brown sugar, or white). Put the contents in a pot... heat up until boiling.... make sure you keep stirring it as it heats, and make sure everything is dissolved well, let it cool down til about luke warm (keep stirring all the time) and put the eggs in for 10-15 minutes. pull one out every once in a while to see how easy they break... do it to the consistency of what you like. Dry them out in a strainer checking on them again every once in a while. take your jar, or container put down a layer of borax, and then a layer of eggs, and keep going like this until you are done.... cured eggs.

Some people talk of just putting the eggs in a nylon and let them soak in the river water for 30 mins or so, this will harden up the eggs, but i don't know if they last long. I will try this on my next batch

[mitch]

I agree with the no cure and freeze just make sure that they well drained of fluids first and remove all the air from the baggie with a straw. No curing at all with river water. If you are using fresh let them sit on a piece of newspaper and let them dry till they shrink a bit (use a fan if you're in a hurry). In that fashion they will be easier to tie and they will plump up ater a drift or so. mitch

[Lunker Larry]

When I lived in BC we used salmon roe for steelhead in fast and high running rivers. To keep it on the small steelhead hooks all we did was lie it out flat and put a layer of salt on it, leave it over night, flip it over, salt again and leave it for around another 12 hours depending on how thick the roe is. When it is firm enough, put it in the feezer. The eggs would become pliable when you want to use it and all we would do was pack it in a ball around the hook. This would prevent snags and the egg ball would milk perfectly. Stinky, but simple and easier to keep on the hook than eggs in borax or all the work to tie egg sacks.
Boy I miss those days on the Queen Charlottes.

[Paya]

few tips from others :
curing skeined roe
Get rid of that vein left in the skein after removing them. Any blood left will darken your eggs. The best way is to put no cure on them at all . Wrap each skein in paper towel. Put them in a zip loc and freeze. The paper towel keeps ice crystals from forming on the eggs while in the freezer. Its the ice crystals which will puncture the eggs while in the freezer and leave you with a gooey, milks out fast mess, when you thaw them out. On the other hand you could pro cure them and they will still work about as good. Pro cured skein can be thawed and refrozen a few times before you have to throw them out. Less waste. Hopefully the action will be so good you won't have to worry about having left over skein.

PRESERVING SINGLE EGGS

You can separate eggs from the membrane in tight skeins by immersing them in water at a temperature of 115? to 120?F and hand-ma#####ulating the egg mass. The membrane coagulates at this temperature, and the eggs may be separated easily without damage.

Materials needed to prepare single eggs include:

? Preservative bath: I part commercial (40 percent) formalin (available at most drug stores) to 20 parts water at about 90? F.

? Dye (if red eggs are desired): 1/4 teaspoon of powdered Safranin-O (available at many drug stores) dissolved in 2 quarts of water.

? Neutralizing-fixing bath: 8 tablespoons of sodium bisulfite (available from photo supply stores and some drug stores) dissolved in 1 gallon of water at 60?F.

? Glycerine: add 6 drops 40 percent formalin per ounce of glycerine.

? Fish-attracting flavors: flavors, such as anise, may be added to glycerine.

Immerse single eggs in the preservative bath for 30 to 45 minutes. Because processing characteristics of eggs vary, these treatment times are guides. Process small batches until you obtain the correct treatment for the eggs. Remove single eggs from the formalin solution while they are still soft but have no trace of a liquid center when sliced in half. The fixing and glycerine treatments will have an additional firming effect. Eggs left in the bath too long are rubbery and undesirable for bait.

You may dye eggs at this point by dipping them in the dye solution for a few minutes. It is thought by some that brightly colored eggs more readily attract fish. The degree of redness depends on the strength of the dye solution and length of immersion time. When the desired color is obtained, rinse the eggs with water.

Immerse eggs in the neutralizing-fixing bath for 20 to 30 minutes to neutralize any further action of the formalin. This prevents undue hardening during storage.

Drain and place in a screw-cap jar for storage. Do not rinse or allow the surface of the eggs to dry before sealing. Pour enough of the glycerine mixture (glycerine, formalin, and anise, if desired) into jar to moisten the eggs but not to cause a noticeable accumulation at the bottom of the jar. Eggs treated in this way will keep for weeks in a warm room and may be stored over a year in the refrigerator.

Agriculture and Natural Sciences

University of California, Davis

Sea Grant Marine Advisory Program

Leaflet W-21114


hope this helps

[Jimmy]

How do I cure salmon eggs?

Try an apple and some anti-biotics!

[FLOATFISHIN]

If the eggs are loose, do nothing to them, put them in a ziplock air removed, leave them in the fride for say 48hrs, then dry them off on a paper towel, and freeze in indavidual baggies with all air removed and freeze.

Skein, scrape all you can away from the membrane and do the same thing, or sprinkle with borax 1st.

F.F

[BBRich]

Just freeze 'em, it's easier and catches more fish (or so I've heard)

[DrB]

How do I cure salmon eggs?

A good dose of TLC will do!

Cheers!
Dr. B.

[aniceguy]

As I have been center pin fishing for well over 25 yrs here is my insight

Loose roe be it chinny brown or rainbow ( mind you most of the trout roe you buy commercially is in fact brook trout roe)

loose roe simply I river cure it for roughly 5 minutes by filling a bag in current ( higher dissolved o2 content) after I have rinsed and filled the bag I remove an egg and I pinch it to see its tolerences. If you cant roll it between your fingers without breaking it keep up this step until your there. I bring them home and I place them in a collander to drain fully ( 20 minutes I find is enough) then I pack them in the amounts I know I will use in a day, insert them into a vaccum bag and vaccum seal them. If you dont have a vaccum sealer then simply suck the air out with a straw like it was said above I go one step above and insert a silica pack in the bag prior to freezing but paper towel is a good trick

Loose on the skein, I find that if Im membrane fishing one of the most important things is to keep the cluster intact, generally I perfer this method for slow moving pocket water.
One thing many guys over look and IMHO will make all the difference bleed the fish as the membrane will be much more translucent and the end resulting eggs will have a supplier cleaner apperance.

ok Skein prep. I will lay them out to air dry for 3o minutes or so patting them gently with paper towel, then I will make a solution of borax water brown sugar and c plus orange drink the latter is for color retention.

I let this mix sit for 30 minutes then drain and pat dry. Once that is done I will cut them in clusters ranging in size from golf balls to dime sizes.

I will take the excess juice from the bowl and mix non flavoured gelatain in that I will then add the skein to it and allow the geletain to set dont over do the gelatain as you dont want jello you want skien clusters that hold on a hook

With singles I will put a pot to boil with a 10 to 1 mix of muratic acid to water bring it to a rolling boil then turn off. When the temp is above tepid I will soak the eggs by dunking inthe acid bath 5 seconds in out to drain and repeat, until the eggs have a spongy feel but when crushed there is still juice, once Im there I will shock them in ice cold water with again a 5 to 1 milk solution this stops any heat process and also nutrulizes the acid.

Thats it.
I l

[jammer]

Here's the steps i take...

First wash your hands wash your hands wash your hands...

Second lay out some newspaper

Third lay down a double layer of paper towel

Lay your loose roe on the paper towel and roll gently around until all undesired fluids are gone ie. blood,membrane usually takes 3 sets up paper towels...

Go to a supplier store and pick up 2oz blue cheese containers (the kind that comes with wings)

Spoon your roe into these containers, snap on your lid, cover in saran wrap, put into ziploc bag (6 per bag) and suck the air out with a straw..

These stack nice in the freezer and each little container is enough for 24 decent sized roe bags... This is the process i do for brown roe...

For single salmon and rainbow roe i will rinse in the creek i caught them in and pat dry and package the same way... good luck fellas...

[Aaron Shirley]

I do one of two things with loose roe I get. The first one, I freeze some of the eggs fresh in small ziplocks with just enough eggs for one outing (no river cure). Second thing I do with the rest of the roe, is cure them. Check out the link for a loose egg cure that works very well. The eggs will keep in the fridge for years without going bad, and the juice that collects at the bottom of the mason jar can be used as scent for yarn or roe bags (and should be removed from the jar to preserve the eggs as well as possible).

http://www.gettinghooked.net/Fishing%20Tips.htm

Good fishing!

Aaron