I saved oil sacs from the 2021-2022 trapping season. I didn't freeze them, just left them out in my cold garage. At the end of season I squeezed them into a glass jar. It was a pickle jar that been thoroughly cleaned. I opened it a few days ago to start squeezing some sacs from this year and man does it stink! I know you can't wash out pickle smell all the way, but it certainly doesn't smell like fresh sac oil even though I did squirt one into it. There's no mold or anything. It's been stored down in the cool basement in the dark. I'm wondering if it's tainted, and whether next year I should be throwing fresh sacs into a jar in the freezer until I have enough time to squeeze em.

My 2 cents worth. It sounds like to me that when you left the in the sacs for the winter that they may have started to taint. as a rule, the sac oil it self doesnt taint or rot but in the sacs, yah that is an aweful smell and if there was any meat left on them for sure to start going bad if not deeply froze.

You should drain the oil from the sacs and keep separate. The only way to keep them intact is to freeze until ready to use. Never use any brine containers for lure/gland or ingredients. Pickle / Olive and other brine type food product containers never lose their mother odor in my experience. I have turned down many hundreds of buckets that could have been used for something else but due to the brine I had to turn them down.

Thank You E.J. and Bob, very helpful. I will modify how I handle them for next year and freeze them right away. I definitely left a little something on them and the garage temperatures do fluctuate. I'll find a better glass jar to store the oil before next year. I had intended to keep the oil for personal use playing around with beaver lures. Would the tainted oil have any value for playing around with personal use predator baits or should I just pitch it?

I would keep it for bait or lure as a personal use material.

Pure sac oil shouldn't taint. I usually keep it in the freezer anyways as convenient place to store it without smelling other stuff up, but it doesn't need froze. The sacs themselves on the other hand... Yeah they'll taint and what I suspect happened to yours was tainted liquid from the sacs got in with the oil when you milked them.

Yes you can add sac oil to tainted ingredients for predator lures so I'm sure you could use your oil in some personal concoctions, it will just be difficult to replicate exactly if you get something you really like.

Oil sac's that have been ground up after oil removal will need to be preserved right?
Any tricks too preserving products with High Oil content? Thanks.

bearcat , sac oil fresh or like you described...is a great predator attractor for me in my area....nice change up lure. But get it down the hole...around here coyotes like to rub /roll on it.

I take my oil sacs an put a layer of salt down then a layer of sacs so on an so on till I get to the top of the bucket ..I have buckets with dates kn from early 2000s ..I just pull them out wash the salt off an milk them when needed

If you ever wanted to get rid of some of them, boy- I'd sure be interested, hahaha

It doesn't taint but the odor does change.

I'll keep that in mind when I'm cleaning out the shop this spring haha..an I agree with Ruger 100%