Homemade Dough Bait

Found this in the Fishing Report, thought I would share it!

Steve

Homemade Trout Dough Bait

Whether you want to try something different than the traditional baits you will find at the local fishing tackle store, or you want to create your own fish-catching concoction—making your own homemade dough bait is both rewarding and sometimes an extremely successful fishing bait. Many anglers are already hip to this technique and have refined their creations and given them their own names. A quick Google search for “homemade trout dough bait” will open your eyes to a variety of different mixtures that people have come up with. Some of the most popular ingredients include: a variety of different dough base options, garlic, salt, anise, tuna, bait-curing products, Kool-Aid and corn. As a beginner homemade dough bait maker, I was interested figuring out a simple recipe that I could start with and then add to in my pursuit of bait perfection. Here is the homemade dough bait recipe that I used, and it worked!

Using ½ can of tuna, 1 teaspoon garlic salt and ¾ cup Bisquick pancake baking mix; knead all the ingredients together by hand until you have a well-mixed dough ball. (I included about half of the water in the tuna can).

Mixing all of these ingredients together into a single ball of dough with the ingredients mixed consistently throughout only took me about 10 minutes, or maybe even less.

It makes sense that these ingredients would work well for catching trout because they have all been used at one time or another to help me catch fish over the years—just not in a single homemade concoction of my own. For instance, I’ve had good success soaking corn in tuna juice and then placing the corn onto the treble hook of a spinner I’m using to fish for kokanee salmon, or a number of different bass plastic lures and traditional trout baits that I’ve used to catch fish will advertise that they are garlic- and salt-scented. If you read through the fishing reports, you will notice many anglers have success catching trout using garlic-scented PowerBait. Heck, I’ve caught bass, trout, catfish and carp by simply balling up a piece of bread and putting it on a hook. So, it makes sense that these ingredients together should do pretty well. And, what do you know, it did work!

Andres Martinez with a 13-inch rainbow trout he caught using homemade dough bait.

It would be fun to add color to this concoction using food coloring or Kool-Aid. I’ve heard Kool-Aid is a good ingredient to use. The options and combinations of ingredients to play with are large part of what making your own dough bait fun.

Any anglers interested in sharing, testing or creating new baits please feel free to contact me - Dustin

Let us know how your fishing trip goes! Share your tips and tricks with your fellow anglers by emailing us at funfishingnm@gmail.com and let’s help the next generation of anglers find success.

Thanks for reading and supporting our angling community!