It has been a while since the fishmeal hype arrived on the continent. About a decade ago, continental carp anglers started baiting up with the fishmeal – robin red type of boilies. By creating a regular flow of these baits they tried to get the carp conditioned and to make them less wary about the likeliness of a rig being set up amongst the baited area. The results of mass baiting and the introduction of that new type of bait were amazing. On the ever-so-busy circuit waters massive hauls of hard to catch carp were realized. And it looked like the long term effectiveness was better than the birdfood type of boilies that were used before.
For the first few years everything went just fine, until the carp got so hammered that mass baiting no longer worked so effectively. The angling then became more technical.

So I had noticed that the positive effect of using this type of bait and approach was no longer as effective as it had ever been, but I still was confident giving Solar's Red Herring a go when Martin Locke offered me the chance to use it.

I remember (and will never forget) using it for the very first time on a rather busy public lake in France. During a five night session, the Red Herring outfished every other bait that went in. The local anglers were astonished to watch this strange Belgian angler catching carp non-stop and with all the biggest of the lakes inhabitants laid upon his unhooking mat!

Red Herring unrivalled attraction for Geert Ooms!

Many witnessed the unhooking mat turning completely red by the digested boilies that were spread all over it. Some anglers even thought the carp were bleeding!

The strangest thing of it all was that the more bait I put in, the more action I got! During this session I’d baited over 80 kilos of air dried 24mm boilies and never had the feeling that I'd reached the point were the fish truly sated and ready to stop feeding. Truly amazing it was.

By the time I was setting off for home, a dozen forties had been banked with three of them over fifty pounds. This was more than a result!

Common carp or mirror carp,
they all love Red Herring!

Back home, I gave them a try on the Belgian circuit waters and was happy to see that this mix made the buzzers scream like in the good old days. It is good to see that carp react positively on this bait, even if they are being fed by look alike baits for quite some time.

If I was to choose just one bait to use for the rest of my life, it would definitely be the Red Herring.

The mixture of pre-digested fishmeals and crustacean or krill extracts combined with the Robin Red sure is a winning combination and results in instant attraction with optimal digestibility. This perfect balance between nutrition and attraction makes these boilies hard to resist.

Another fish votes YES to the Red Herring.

Here are some of the recipes that I’ve used the past three years:

1 kg Red Herring mix
6 ml squid & octopus flavour
2 ml ester cream flavour
20 ml slayer salmon oil
( in winter or colder water just leave out the salmon oil )

1 kg Red Herring mix
5 ml squid & octopus flavour
5 ml smoked salmon flavour
5 gr salt & pepper enhancer
20 ml amino stimulin compound