Easily produce wonderfully cured salmon roe

Although catching and harvesting King Salmon from Mat-Su Valley streams has been very restrictive during the first half of the summer, 4 other species of salmon should be migrating up Mat-Su streams before long. Bait fishing is scheduled to open in Susitna River drainage streams on July 14 — so if a person should happen to harvest some salmon with roe — now is a great time to cure the roe for fishing during the second half of Mat-Su Valley’s too - short summer salmon season.

My wife, a couple friends, and I made a salmon dip netting trip to Chitina last week, and although we somewhat mis-timed our trip, we did harvest a reasonable number of salmon before the river swelled with rain and snowmelt. Swollen waters and recent low migration numbers caused salmon catching to drop off considerably during the latter part of our trip.

Maintaining Bait Quality Before Curing

After harvesting our salmon we maintained fish quality by killing the fish immediately, bleeding them, before storing them on ice in a cooler. At the end of each fishing session we filleted salmon, and harvested the two roe skeins from each female fish. Salmon fillets and roe were packaged in plastic bags and once again stored in a clean cooler with plenty of ice. The same steps that maintain fillet quality for eating also maintain the roe quality for later curing into bait.

Curing Supplies

My wife and I use 3 plastic containers, a colander / strainer, cure / scent, and a flat drying surface with recycled paper shopping bags or newspaper to soak up extra moisture.

Our first step in curing is to sprinkle about a 1/8- inch layer of Fire Cure into a recycle gallon ice cream tub (a larger bucket could be used for larger batches of roe). Scent / spice such as Fire Power powdered krill, powdered garlic, or vanilla can be added to create more distinctive baits.

Place a layer of roe on top of the cure. For small skeins of sockeye, coho, or pink salmon roe we sometimes use whole skeins as a layer — but for larger and more mature skeins we cut into bait-sized pieces before placing them in the bucket as a bait layer. When cutting bait-sized pieces of roe I like to make them a bit larger than I may want to fish — as they will lose some mass during the curing process.

Alternate a 1/8 -inch layer of cure/ scent with each layer of roe, until all the roe is in the tub, and topped by a final layer of cure.

Mix the cure and roe layers. Bait cures come in a variety of colors, and deep-red colored roe often seems to maintain its color longer when fished — therefore we most often use a deep red-colored cure or a mixture of red and orange-colored cures. The dyes used in the cures are quite powerful so some anglers prefer using a non-colored cure. To avoid bright red-colored hands, I always wear a surgical glove on my mixing hand, when gently stirring the roe and cure layers to distribute cure more evenly throughout the roe. When fishing with cured roe, I also wear surgical gloves and wash my gloved hands each time after handling bait to keep my hands and fishing gear clean.

Drain. Immediately after mixing, the cure will start drawing moisture out of the roe. We like to let the roe soak in this juice for about 4 hours giving the cure / moisture time to fully saturate the roe. For a firmer bait that stays on the hook longer, we remove the roe from the juice before it is reabsorbed. We do this by dumping our tub of curing roe into a colander / strainer on top of a bucket. The excess egg juice will drain into the bucket. I often save the egg juice by packaging it in a plastic jar and storing it in a freezer. It can be used as a scent/bait, or after thawing, it can be used to rejuvinate older roe baits that may have become too dry over time. Pautzke’s Nectar can be used in the same manner.

Dry. The roe is now soft cured and quite wet. To dry it a bit, so it will firm up and stay on the hook longer, we spend it out on a flat surface covered with recycled paper shopping bags or old newspaper. The paper will help absorb excess moisture and help keep your flat surface clean. An advantage to curing roe earlier in the summer, is drying time is usually shorter and the process often works better. We like to dry in a shaded area, away from direct sunlight. Shorter dry times produce softer bait, while roe that has been dried too long may not milk as well, when fished, and may break or fall apart. My wife’s recommendation is to dry to the consistency of a gummy bear.

Storage. Bait that will be used immediately can be stored in zip lock bags or other plastic containers, but should be kept cool and protected from the weather. We like to double bag and freeze any uncured roe that will not be used in a couple days. Properly cured, packaged, and frozen bait has produced good catches for us even when stored up to 3 years before use.

You may want to experiment with or simplify this roe curing process — but producing your own salmon roe bait can be an enjoyable and money saving experience — particularly fun and enjoyable for kids.

Good Luck and Fish On!

Andy Couch has been a pro staff member with Pautzke Bait Company for more than a decade.