Skein doesn't water harden well. You may as well just skip it: stuff the skein in a bag, take em home and scrape them. Soak up excess goo with a paper towel, then throw them in a ziploc with borax, or one of the commercial cures. Let it sit In the fridge overnight and they will be good to go. My favourite commercial cure is procure, and if I don't use that I use plain borax. I don't water harden or salt eggs, I used to do this 20-25 years ago, and prided myself on rock hard eggs that turned out perfect roe bags. I cheated myself of of a lot of extra fish back then. I now use jam bags that last maybe 10 drifts before they milk out if I'm lucky. More often 4 or 5. The bait produces far better than hard eggs. It leaves a scent cloud behind it in the water. Anyway, try again with some fresh eggs, but cut it up and cure a small portion first , and see what the results are like. If you are happy with the outcome, do the rest the same way!
