CRASH TEST: Pautzke Nectar

Info: Pautzke Bait Co.

Ave. Retail: $5.99 - $6.59

Wild Country Rating:

Is there anybody out there who doesn't have a jar or two of Pautzke's Balls 'o' Fire eggs rolling around in their tackle box? The venerable red salmon egg has been part of the western trout scene for as long as any of us have been alive.

Pautzke Nectar, though? I'd say that the majority of the West's salmon and steelhead anglers have been missing the boat on this product.

Too bad, because it's one of the easiest, most effective all-around scent/dye agents on the market.

Eggs to Nectar: All you have to do is read the ingredient list for Nectar to understand how effective it is as a herring additive. Nectar is simply the liquid that spills off the massive vats of eggs as they're cooked and cured in Pautzke's Ellensburg factory. During the patented cooking process, gigantic cauldrons of fresh salmon eggs are slowly cooked and cured in a proprietary mix of salts and sugars, and the effluent runoff (Nectar) contains those basic components, plus the basic red, orange and yellow dyes used in Balls 'o' Fire, Orange Deluxe and Yellow Jacket eggs, AND the pure juice of salmon eggs.

Sugars, salts, dye and pure egg juice: if there's a better combination of ingredients to boost your herring for Chinook, I'd like to see it.

Simple, straightforward: Unlike other commercial herring dyes and scents, there's no mixing to be done with Nectar: just dump a bottle of it into a container, put your herring in, and you're done.

NON STAINING!: This is a big benefit for those of you who handle a lot of herring. Nectar DOES NOT STAIN. You don't have to treat it like sulfuric acid, and you don't have to freak out if some of it spills on your boat.

The scent trail: Swanny sums up the potent Nectar scent profile: "It really has the fishy smell, from the egg runoff. Anytime you can make your bait smell like fish, the more springers you're going to attract to your bait."

Swanny would know: he boated 209 springers on the Columbia last year using Nectar as his primary herring scent.

Size, colors, where to buy: Pautzke Nectar is available in red, yellow and orange, and can be purchased at the following locations: Sportco, Outdoor Emporium, Viking Marine, Dick's Sporting Goods, Sportsmen's Warehouse, 3 Rivers Marine.

PAUTZKE NECTAR SPECS
Sizes: Available in 8-ounce bottles
Colors: Red, yellow, orange
Key Features:

• Contains the sugar/salt curing agents that Pautzke uses on their salmon eggs
• Also contains pure egg juice that runs off Balls 'o' Fire, Yellow Jacket and Orange Deluxe eggs
• NON-STAINING dyes
• Simple, straightforward to use: just add Nectar to your basic herring brine

-JS