Mixing Cures To Obtain The Perfect Flourescent Egg

By John Albrich | 09/12/2012

Fall salmon is one of my favorite times of the year. The fishing is normally good, eggs are readily available and I get to cure a lot of them. During salmon season I make a habit of bringing several different eggs. Salmon can be finicky. I never know what type of egg they will want and I like to have a diverse platter of eggs to ensure my client’s success.

While I often use standard FireCure colors (red, orange and pink – I don’t use natural) those colors don’t necessarily produce my go-to egg, although mixing them does. Through fall my favorite egg is florescent red and creating it is easier than you might believe.

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To some anglers mixing cures is intimidating. Meanwhile, I’m here to tell you it’s simpler than most expect. The reason why I mix colors is to have eggs that fish haven’t seen before. I don’t want my bait to look the same as every else’s. I want something different that the salmon aren’t used to seeing.

When you have 100 boats fishing the same bait if you throw something different at then you are going to whack them, hence mixing FireCure colors. I’m big on making a fluorescent egg. I want that egg to glow more. And, it’s not that hard to do it. Mixing pink and orange FireCure makes a glow in the dark red egg.

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Your standard bottle of Fire Cure does a great job and making standard colors, but I’m looking for something powerful. Thinking outside the box creates fabulous results and you are about to see how easy it is to do so.

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The Albrich Florescent Red Egg Cure

Step 1: Obtain blood free skeins. This recipe is good for four to six skeins (and for king eggs).

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Step 2: Measure 1/8 cup of orange FireCure and ¼ cup of pink FireCure

Step 3: Mix the orange and pink in a cup

Step 4: Butterfly eggs and lay them in Ziploc bag one skein at a time

Step 5: Sprinkle the cure into the eggs in layers. You don’t want to pour all the cure at once. Sprinkle some on and then lay another skein.

Step 6: Massage the cure into the eggs with your hands (wearing latex gloves to keep hands from being stained)

Step 7: Let the eggs sit for a few hours, flipping the bag every few hours. Once they’ve juiced out and reabsorbed the juice back, the Ziploc bag will almost looked like it’s been vacuum sealed. The air will be sucked out of the bag. Now your eggs are ready to fish or ready to be dried out to the consistency you want them.

Tips:

For salmon, I like a wetter egg that milks out quick. For slower water a wet egg is fine. However, for faster water you want to dry them out a little to ensure the egg is more firm. This way the egg won’t break up in the current.

Editor’s Note: This is Part 1 of a three-part series illustrating different ways to cure eggs.

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