Stripe Tuna For Bait

[nelnarn]

Hi Raiders,

Last weekend we managed to get on to some striped tunas just off Cronulla trolling with lures. I was wanting to head out again soon and catch some for bait which i plan to use Nov/Dec.

Can some please advise the best way to store the fish until the end of the year. Can i simply just freeze them or do they need to be prepared some way?

Thanks for your help.

Jas

[james7]

G'day Jas

There were some posts on this recently. Might pay you to do a search.

There is this one: "Salting Bonito For Bait" from a couple of weeks ago.

http://fishraider.com.au/Invision/index.ph...=salting+bomito

There is also this:

http://www.fishraider.com.au/fishing-artic...ishing-bait.php

(I hope this link works)

We caught a heap of stripies a month ago and filleted and salted them. We've used them the last two weeks and they were okay. (I caught three snapper using them!)

We cut the fillets into slabs so they fit into the plastic containers (ones about lunch box size). Then we put the first layer of fish into the tray, skin side down, and cover with a good layer of salt. Then you keep repeating this until the container is full. We used quite a few kgs of salt, but it's cheap anyway.

We then put most of them into the freezer. The containers that didn't fit in the freezer we put in the fridge. With these ones, after a few days, we poured off the excess liquid and repeated the salting process.

Hope this helps.

Cheers

Peter

Edited June 17, 2009 by peterS

[tan the fisherman]

Thats exactly the way - thats what we did and works fine - keeps for ages in the fridge or freezer.

Use swimmimg pool salt as its heaps cheaper and you need alot.

Edited June 18, 2009 by tan the fisherman

[nelnarn]

Hi Pete,

Thanks for the advice..I will give it a go...

I have been reading your reports of late with interest and seems that you have been having some success. Looks like you blokes have a really good time out on the water. I also fish out of the hacking and off Cronulla but have never ventured down to the hump but would like to. I have a quintrex bayraider 560 with an oldish 90 evinrude on the back. I was just wondering how long it might take to get down there? approx amount of fuel used? when you arrived and anchored what depth were you anchored in? I was also thinking it might be easier to just drive down the coast and put the boat in at on one of the local ramps????

I am really keen to have a crack at some snapper in the coming months....

Keep the reports coming as i really enjoy reading them.

Regards

Jas