Fishing Frenzy

Robin Red is a carp bait additive that has had an incredible effect on carp catches for decades, but its recipe and how it works is surrounded by controversy and relatively few carp anglers use it to its full potential. Discover some clues about it and its very effective use here...

Robin Red is part of the range of bird foods from a company called Haiths of Cleethorpes England. At present their top ten selling products include the following: Robin Red, Red Factor, Nectarblend, Red Band, Prosecto Insectivorous, Soft Bill, Multi Mix, and Carpticle Mix, Super Red and hempseed. This company have many decades of experience formulating specialised foods for birds for all stages of development and for enhancing plumage, growth, health and so on and these products ideally fit the bill as it were for carp!

Among such bird food products Robin Red is the best known and is literally a legend when it comes to carp bait ingredients and additives etc today. Hinders offer other bird foods which have also been integral in the success and universal use of bird food based carp baits throughout the world today. Countless modern carp bait companies have taken hinders and Rod Hutchinsons leads for example and formulated their own commercial bird food based baits ranges and now additives and liquids etc based around robin red and chilli for instance are extremely fashionable and successfully proven; such as the Ccmoore Red Venom additive.

Robin Red has been used by most commercial bait companies at some time or another and is so prevalent that in some cases it might be your unique homemade bait perhaps is the only boilie bait that does not contain it on your water! Beware that any successful ingredient, additive or flavour etc, when over-used, can conversely act as a marker for danger and it might be a bonus to use very little of it in your bait sometimes. You might choose to use a component of it instead, perhaps just the red chilli peppers part instead, or add these to boost a proportion of Robin Red perhaps for a winter and spring bait.

Uses and methods of application of robin Red are many, and it can be added to boilie and pellets base mixes, ground baits of all forms (and clouds water and dyes your dyes fingers red! Try dampening Robin Red with PVA-friendly liquids such as the excellent Ccmoore Red Venom, (which is absolutely ideal for the job,) and contains certain very concentrated levels of similar Robin Red bioactive components! Robin Red used in solution (with water added) produces a good bait soak for boilies, pellets and as liquid boosts for ground baits and maggots etc; although this watered-down version is not as intensely stimulating as Red Venom which as a concentrated product is most excellent for summer conditions and winter especially.

So exactly what is Robin Red; after all it certainly colours up the water attractively and even stains your hands a distinctive red?! The recipe of Robin Red is shrouded in mystery, controversy and endless speculation, and perhaps all you can say for certain, is that is does not contain Carophyll Red, (but this does not exclude it containing cantaxanthin perhaps...) Robin Red certainly does contain many bioactive components and substances, including antioxidant pigments (plumage colour enhancing agents highly stimulatory to carp!)

In making homemade boilies just using an ounce of Robin Red per pound of dry mix will certainly boost the effectiveness of very many base mixes and especially when you use a very cheap mix based on crushed Red Band, semolina and soya flour for instance. While adding Robin Red to dampened pellets and to liquids to make Robin Red dips works why not try the purpose-designed Red Venom from Ccmoore which is highly soluble and clouds the water red; ideal for winter and summer use! One combination from Haiths that is particularly outstanding is their Super Red which is a mix of the following and can be used dry in PVA bags:

Robin Red, crushed tiger nuts, crushed Carpticle, peanut granules, crushed hemp seed, Red Factor, teasel seed, and aniseed oil. You can apply this as a paste bait, method mix or ground bait and many bait companies have their own unique versions so do investigate them and get catching big-time, (for more big carp secrets read on...)

By Tim Richardson.