Prawns:
The ‘Swiss Army
Knife’of
Baits
THE VERSATILITY OF PRAWNS, AND EASE OF CURING THEM,
MAKES THEM ONE OF THE MOST POPULAR SALMON BAITS
AROUND. STORY AND PHOTOS BY ERIC MARTIN
WHILE SALMON ARE CURRENTLY
FLOODING waters all up and down
the West Coast, anglers everywhere
are searching for the best bait options
to help fill their freezers with prime
fillets. But don’t start hoarding
herring or counting your eggs jars
just yet. Those oil-laden red fillets
hint at yet another highly effective
bait option for targeting salmon and
steelhead alike.
The highly soughtafter, rich,
red-orange pigmentation of salmon
and steelhead flesh is caused by a diet
of organisms rich in carotenoids such
as krill, shrimp and prawns. Given
this obvious affinity for shellfish, it
only makes sense to use them as bait.
Prawns are the ‘Swiss Army knife’
of baits, and what makes them so
absolutely deadly on both salmon
and steelhead is that they offer unmatched
versatility, durability, availability
and scent, while also proving
to be extremely cost effective.
Unlike herring or eggs, which
can have a very narrow range of
usage applications, prawns can quite
literally be fished with all popular
methods used to chase salmon and
steelhead from bank or boat. When
water conditions favor bait, prawns
can be trolled, plunked, drift fished,
back-bounced, fished with divers or
suspended under bobbers. But when
tactics change over to hardware such
as spinners or plugs, don’t put those
prawns away just yet! By sliding a
few beads, a quick change clevis and
spinner blade on your leader above
the prawn, you now have a trolling
rigging featuring the powerful scent
of a quality bait, with the attention
grabbing thump and flash of
a spinner. Do you like to run plugs
with sardine wraps? Give prawn tails
a try. Simply take a tail, split lengthwise
about half the distance from the
fat end to the tip of the tail, center
around the belly eyelet on a plug and
secure with a few wraps of stretchy
thread. They won’t get bit, they’ll get
eaten. Prawns are without question
one of the most versatile baits I have
ever fished.
Durability is another key feature
of a well-cured or brined prawn
that can be lacking with other baits.
Strong current and warm water temperatures
wreak havoc on herring and
eggs, requiring you to spend more
time re-baiting, less time actually fishing,
and more money at the end of
20 SALMON THE TAILOUT & STEELHEAD JOURNAL
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