Salting bait for the winter months

[Lynnzer]

I have a freezer full of macky and a few bags of mussel and other things that I'm thinking of salting to use in the winter months.

From past experience salting doesn't take anything away fro the bait as far as the fishability is concerned as I've caught on salted lug alongside fresh lug next hook up.

Salted did last longer on the hook though as it's tougher and not so easily stripped by crabs.

Now, here's the thing, so far I've used just ordinary table salt as I haven't done much salting so far. However with a lot in front of me now I'm looking at a 25kg bag of rock salt. Bit confused on this though as the stuff I've found at the likes of builders merchants is for use for roads in the winter and more than likely is a mix of salt and gravel.

If that's the case, and that's what's meant by the generic term of "rock Salt" then I have a council bin full of the stuff at the bottom of our road for use in the winter.

Or is there a proper, you know what I mean, roack salt which is just salt, and if so any ideas where to get it from?

[OuTkast76]

Makro and ordinary supermarkets like asda sell edible bags of rock salt, Just use a pepper grinder when salting stuff down

[fishingmark]

I use the commercial salt used in dishwashers, etc and it works fine. As Chris says you could grind it down a bit.

[Bob C]

Have tried various but nothing compares imo to Table Salt. You can get it in large bags from Supermarkets cheaply. As for drying & reusing, it never worked for me. The Oils it drew out of the Bait kept it moist no matter how I tried to dry it.

[Lynnzer]

Dishwasher salt it is then.
20kg for less than a tenner delivered on fleabay. Finish, too.

If the missus sees it and objects I can tell her I'm on a savings spree since the stuff we use and buy in Asda costs a bomb.
All the references to table salt are for Dead Sea salt and cost a bomb.

[Thunderpants]

"Rock Salt" is just a term for salt that has been dug out of the ground. It does not contain any rock or gravel. It is the same chemical compound as table salt (sodium chloride) just not very pure so it's not as white and not good for food use. It has a larger particle size too so if you want to use it for salting bait you may want to grind it up first in a mortar and pestle.

[adam.d]

I salted some left over macky last year and it fished just as good as unsalted. Beauty of it is tho it goes like shoe leather so doesnt come off when cast and if whitey bashing then ya get 3 or 4 casts out if the same bit 😉

[Lynnzer]

I salted some left over macky last year and it fished just as good as unsalted. Beauty of it is tho it goes like shoe leather so doesnt come off when cast and if whitey bashing then ya get 3 or 4 casts out if the same bit 😉

Same as with lug. I bought some yesterday morning, slated it for 3 hours and it was great in the afternoon session. It was just squeezy enough to put on a hook without oozing all over the place and the crabs didn't take it off as quick either.

I had a few decent knocks fishing between the pier ends at Seaham but didn't connect with anything. Point is that at least the fish were still into it as bait.

Some bluey I took out the freezer was soft as $hit and just flaked apart so there's my next salting task when my Finish arrives.