Now you have done it. I went straight to part of a 5 Guy's burger, wrapper and all rammed down the hole. The neighbors had the fox named and etc. Worked too.

I prefer to age or taint base materials first before adding preservative's. With Meat, I prefer moderate temps and longer time periods.

If you added your preservatives first, I don't think you would get much aging except for the top air exposed material. I happen to agree with moderate controlled or indoor temperatures for aging meats and glands. Indoor aging is the easiest to control and to minimize the flies and other pests.

Thanks for sharing Jonesie. Ur response was exactly what I was asking for. As I’m trying to sift thru the trapping world and find techniques and styles that make sense to me that answer is good to hear. Sometimes I feel like there’s gateceeping and mysticism in making baits and lures. Like a bait has to be this elaborate sun rendered, buried under ground, this amount of taint or that amount of time and all these crazy little rabbit holes to go down when in all reality a bait as simple Lazarus bacon bait can put a hurting on coyotes. It seems like a KISS principal and y make it more complicated then it needs to be? I’m glad this post has opened up and more ppl r responding, I love hearing everyone’s thoughts and ideas on baits and lures. Thanks guys!

One thing I’d like to add and many of the professionals alluded to…spend time learning and testing your base materials and success will follow. While we as lure and bait makers relish in the details of a formula (3 drops of bat blood, a quarter teaspoon of fertilized dodo egg) the base is truly the component that separates a great lure from a mediocre lure (or even a poor lure).

I want to say here I was giving thoughts on how to figure things out and such for yourself. To come up with what you want or need. Different things and conditions will make something turn out differently. I myself have fresh bait formulas, and I have formulas in the meat/ flesh that are aged to a certain taint and then stopped, and some that take one year to work out. I have a bait, Banana Supreme, that the ADC field uses so much that I am always making it non-stop. It takes ten weeks to complete, and depending on the time of year I make it, the color will be different. The smell and taste are the same, just the color will go from light to dark. The animals don't care, and the ADC folks don't care. But the fur trappers really care, LOL

I keep quiet for the most part because I use this page to learn from those who are far more advanced than myself, like Paul, Bob, and others that post. I had to learn by jars blowing up, mistakes, and just trying things from a thought. I did not have thou shall do this, and thou shall not do that guideline. Just let's see what happens because back then, no one gave out the information this page gives. Paul really opened up a very secret field with this page. To which I am very pleased with him doing that, but I will still keep a lot to myself also and keep learning from others, LOL

Good posts Ron, Bob and Paul....I've gotta a lot to learn about baits.
Paul I remember reading a story about Charlie using fast food restaurant greases for pre-bait stations....that was a good read.

Yes, he had a formula for what he called Pre-Bait. He sold many gallons of it over the years, The base for this was used fast food cooking oil that he would get from various fast food restaurants. He sold the recipe to a fella in Kansas. The fella he sold it to never put it on the market that I know of.

I've had a lot of trappers wanting this Pre-Bait after dad passed. They had great success with it and were a bit dismayed when i would tell them that I can't make it because dad sold the formula.