Greetings! Just picked up some Dobbin's bait solution stuff at a trapping convention. Other than the bottle saying that it treats 1 gallon of meat, I can't find any other instructions for this. I have never made bait before, please bare with me. The gentleman who sold it to me said to add it into a gallon of meat and stir it for a few days and that's it. I have more questions tho. Chunks or ground? Do I let it get stinky for a couple days before I add the special sauce? Is it better to try small batches of different stuff? How many days do you stir it for? I have some fermented caster and some old venison roasts that i was thinking of using. I also have some skunk, coon, and woodchuck. What do you guys use? Any help or advice would be GREATLY appreciated!

Thank yall in advance.

This is what I do. Everyone does things a little different because of where they live and a thousand other conditions.

You can taint to your desired level or not at all
Chunk or ground doesn't matter
I stir it in when I'm done tainting
Venison I have used with success but woodchuck around here out preforms it for me.
Castor and a host of other additives can be added, but I don't anymore
I personally wouldn't use coon

If I were you I'd try two half gallon batches.

The taint has to be stopped before adding the solution. I wait at least a week to make sure it’s stopped. Sodium benzate must be added to stop the taint. Add the solution and mix it every day for three or four days and then every two weeks or so.

There should be directions for use of the sodium benzoate packet attached to the bottle, and there should be directions on the back for the bait solution.
If the meat is ground, it will stabilize sooner than meat that is chunked. It takes longer for the sodium benzoate solution to penetrate into the chunks than it does for the ground meat.
I advise to stir once every day or two for about a week to ten days, depending on the temperature. The warmer the environment the quicker it works. Once the meat stops gassing, you can put it into containers. No refrigeration is necessary.

Since you're just starting out, there's a lot to take in- fortunately this part is pretty straight forward and you've been given great advice above. If you're the type of person that likes to tinker and put your own twist on things to try and make it kind of your own, I'd prepare the whole gallon of meat the same way. I prefer ground meat over cubed because you can get a quicker, more thorough mix of everything, also, it'll smear in sets where you want it smeared where a chunk will just sit there. Ideally, if you have a critter checking out your dirt hole and it's close enough to take a chunk of bait from a hole, you should have already caught it, but as trappers we know things don't often go as planned- that's another reason I like ground bait, it can be harder for the critter to get it out of a hole which should get you more foot action at a set and increase chances of picking that critter up that came in and may have avoided the pan on initial approach.

There are a whole lot of ingredients you can add to give your concoction a slightly different odor profile, just remember that ingredients need time to be thoroughly incorporated to a formulation, so don't keep adding until YOUR nose is happy.... Canines, etc can smell the slightest amount of ingredients you add. You can find all sorts of info on ingredients either here in the archives or in the many books published on bait and lure making. Best of Luck!!!