The New Robins in Carp Bait: Early Positive Feedback

Friday, 1st March 2013

There has been considerable interest in the bait world over the announcement by Haith’s SuperCatch that three new ‘Robins’ would be added to the range of carp bait additives to supplement their flagship product ROBIN RED ® . The idea behind these new ingredients is to allow bait makers to utilise much of the attraction of the original product, Robin Red, without the subsequent – possibly unwanted – consequence of having the bait finish up a deep red colour. Thus naturally yellow birdfoods base mixes can be coloured orange, green or gold, and still maintain some of the taste and attraction offered by Robin Red (which would otherwise create red baits). The New Robins all have their own unique flavour to keep Carp guessing. Today, though, I want to concentrate on their colour.

You can see just how deeply Robin Red influences the original Enervite bait in this first photograph. Similarly 50/50 mixes, nut baits, and even fishmeal base mixes can also be tailored to suit personal preferences. As an initial experiment I asked my friends at Nutrabaits if they would help me test the new Robins by including them in batches of one of their prime sellers, Enervite. This is one of Nutrabaits initial base mixes and it was introduced to the bait market in 1987. It has been going strong ever since. Enervite leans heavily on Robin Red to form part of its attractor package, so it was an ideal test bed for Enervite with ROBIN ORANGE™, Enervite with ROBIN GREEN™ and Enervite with ROBIN GOLD™.

I asked Nutrabaits to substitute the Robin Red for one of the three new Robins, adding each one at the same level as they would were they making their original Enervite. This produced three batches of bait: Enervite/Robin Gold, Enervite/Robin Green and Enervite/Robin Orange. I asked simply for these to be flavoured with Fruit Special and 1ml of Geranium Essential Oil and then requested that the bait rolling company Rollin’ Baits cut the sausages into small 12mm x15mm barrels rather than round boilies. The results I think you will agree are rather impressive.

Since the news of the new Robins was released I have been asked in what way they differ from each other and from original Robin Red. Well, without giving too much away I can say this:

The recipe for Robin Red remains exactly the same as before. Untouched in fact. The new Robins share some of the ingredients of Robin Red and those ingredients are included at exactly the same level as in Robin Red. The ingredients are blended in the same order and sequence as Robin Red, and the different Robins are machine-blended for exactly the same time (as Robin Red). Hence the USP(Unique Selling Point): “Three new bait ingredients – same Robin Red Technology.”

The three new Robins can be compared with the original in this next photo, which shows balls of water-based paste made up of blends of 90% Red Factor with a 10% inclusion rate of each of the four Robins, including the original.

Here you can see top right Robin Orange, top left Robin Gold, bottom right Robin Green and bottom left original Robin Red.

I have shared this new technology with a few friends in and around my local area, and I believe Bill Cottam at Nutrabaits has also been field testing the new attractors. I have also given both the powdered version and some finished baits to a few of my fellow members of Carp Forum. I am awaiting a response from some of these guys but Brian Mills (WATERWOLF) has been doing some early experiments using his own favourite fishmeal base mix and has been kind enough to allow us to share the results of his labours. This is his initial report and the following three photos are also his:

This is a photo of the new Robins incorporated in a base that has total 35% fishmeal. The base also includes kelp and seaweed meals, birdfoods, Soya, semolina, and a small amount of Casilan (calcium caseinate). From left to right in the picture is: standard base, Robin Green, Robin Orange and then Robin Gold, all being incorporated at 10%. As can be seen the Robin Gold is only just visible but it is a lot more visible in a washed out bait. If one was using a darker fishmeal like sardine/anchovy then the Robin Gold would not be showing up at all. I therefore decided to lower the inclusion rate of the Green and the Orange at the same time increasing the Gold to 15%, thinking that the taste of the Robins will still be there at 5 % but at 15 % the Gold colour should show through.

In these photos you can see that the baits have only just been placed on the drying tray after boiling, giving a better representation of how I am fishing the baits. The baits including Robin Orange and Robin Green are only at 5% and the bait using Robin Gold, it is included at 15%. You can see the baits after being air dried for a few hours. As can be seen, even at 5% the Robin Green and Robin Orange come through very well, as does the Robin Gold used at 15%.

We thank Brian for his first impressions and look forward to his and others’ further observations.

It is still early days yet, but I can tell you, the trade has been very receptive of the new Robins, clearly seeing the potential for a powerful attractor that is built around the Robin Red concept and technology, but one that can be tailored to colour finished bait another colour other than red, and I think you can see by this last photograph that shows the Robins in their ‘raw’ state, just how effective these new additions to the bait world will be.

If you are a fan of Robin Red – and who isn’t! – but have always yearned for Robin Red but without the red…well, here it is. Give it a try!

Written by Ken Townley

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