Since you are reading this, you have seen the trend of soaking and marinating catfish bait in Jell-O. This is a tasty trend that is supposed to attract more catfish to your bait. But, does Jell-O make catfish bait better?
Yes, Jell-O can make certain catfish baits work better. The Jell-O adds scent and flavor to catfish baits.
This makes them more enticing for catfish as well as helps the catfish find your bait. I have tested this strategy out and have found success with it.
It seems like these Jell-O scents do a great job of catching small channel catfish and bullheads.
Bigger, older, wiser catfish don’t seem to like these scents and flavors as much.
Strawberry Jell-O seems to work best for catfish bait. This could be because of the bright red color resembles blood.
It could also be that catfish just love the taste and smell of strawberry.
I have tested out many different flavors, and strawberry does work the best.
This process is very simple. Put whatever catfish bait you are planning to use in a ziploc bag.
The best baits for this process are hot dogs and chicken breast. Next, just poor in the Jell-O powder into the bag and mix it around.
Let this mixture marinate for a couple of days to let it soak in as much as possible.
You can also mix the Jell-O into dough bait or stink bait recipes. I personally don’t use dough or stink baits, but feel free to test it out.
Kool-aid can make catfish bait better, but doesn’t work as well as Jell-O.
The Jell-O makes a nice slimy coating in the catfish bait that releases lots of scent and flavor.
I honestly would much rather use plain chicken or hot dog rather than soaking it in kool-aid.
The best catfish attractant is always going to be natural scents. Blood, flesh, and guts will always beat artificial and grocery store scents.
This is why cut bait works better than all other catfish baits.
Don’t get me wrong, a little Jell-O or artificial scents can sometimes catch you a few more fish. But as a rule of thumb, natural is always better.
So yes, Jell-O does make catfish bait better. But I would focus more on getting high quality, natural baits rather than trying to improve grocery store baits.
The basic principle of Jell-O is that it adds more scent an flavor. Which is true, but I don’t think it is worth the trouble.
