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Posts: 929
Location: Rhinelander. | I was just wondering about this after seeing the new mich record photos. Truely big fis inhale most musky baits. The mouth on these critters is huge.When I look back at the huge fish that have been kept in the last few years almost were said they had to be. If baits were only allowed two hooks would some of these monsters still be out there in the lakes to be caught again.
There is talk about barbless hooks and circle hooks for lve bait but not much said on the number of hooks. I do believe that on most baits 2 larger hooks would be enough for big fish. You may miss some smaller fish, I don't know but wondering what you think.
Pfeiff |
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Posts: 194
| Come on, Pfeiff. The fish swallowed the bait. Are you suggesting we outlaw REAR hooks. The rear hook (on the tail end) prolly did the damage. Stuff happens sometimes. Noone wants it to but it does. I'm sure you never hooked a fish deep or even, god forbid, USED a three hook bait. To answer the question direct, Yes, three hooks on some baits ARE necessary. Shoot, I'd like to see 4 hooks on some of the giant baits, but that would be illegal. I think you might be a little misguided here. Well intentioned, but still misguided. |
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Posts: 402
Location: Eagle River, WI | Bulldawgs only have 2 hooks (not including the top hook). I had a 36" swallow a mag dawg Sunday and I had to cut the hooks out of him. Fish will swallow baits no matter how many hooks they have. It's an unfortnate "side effect" to our sport. |
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| I am under the impression the idea is to hook the fish.... |
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Posts: 540
Location: MN | I think that we should not use any hooks it's all about the strike anyway  As said above it doesn't matter how many hooks fish inhale some baits. I had a 38" eat a pounder to it's butt last month all 3 hooks were cut guppie swam away fine. |
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Posts: 1220
| For me, the important thing is to (1) not give a darn about losing the hooks and (2) to have a tool onboard and at-the-ready that is capable of EASILY cutting the center shank on the biggest hook you own. and (3) a quality split-ring pliers so that you don't waste even a minute thinking that it's going to be a pain in the butt to replace what you have cut in just a few seconds. Personally, I think you can cut and replace a badly placed trebble faster than it often takes to dig it out, and at a lot less stress on your fish. Honestly, it's painful to watch some of the drama I've seen watching guys try not to ruin their bait at the expense of a fish. Not only that, but with a few exceptions, you can buy better hooks than what the bait came with. Marty Forman |
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| Junkman - 9/30/2009 7:51 AM Honestly, it's painful to watch some of the drama I've seen watching guys try not to ruin their bait at the expense of a fish. Marty Forman I bought a brand new DCG just a day before and I had a 49" swallow it completely. Alone in the dark, I did not hesitate. I cut the lure in half and started cutting all the tinsel away so I could see where the hooks were. After removing most of the lure I could see a lot better and then got the rest of the hooks cut and removed. Also, when fish are hooked like this, I never take them out of the water. A measuring stick used in the water gave me an easy 49", probably was a little bigger but I didn't care. This fish swam away.
Edited by Baby Mallard 9/30/2009 1:10 PM
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| All you need to do is hone your skills and pay attention at all times to what is going on with your bait, in hopes that you can anticipate the strike so you only hook it in the non inner mouth regions. It's hard. |
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Posts: 146
Location: where the fish are... | Just like baby mallard said, He tore apart a brand new bait, Im pretty sure that if we all had to pay 15-35$ per fish we would, I know that most of us are not so fortunate enough to catch a fish a bait but if you think of it that way Im #*^@ happy to spend 20$ average on a fish no questions asked. |
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Posts: 311
Location: Ontario | Up until this season I would have said that tail hooks are just there for show. Most fish are caught on the front half of the lure, all the tail hook does is foul the fish in the eye, gills etc. Most of my trolling baits don't have a tail hook. BUT this year everything is nipping the tail hook. We are not seeing or catching many muskies but the ones we are landing are all being tail-hooked and so are all the bigger pike (been a good year for them at least). If I fished water with high density I'd probably really cut down the hooks and go to singles everywhere I could. Once a single goes in, its usually not coming out. Plus with that third treble I think there comes a point where the extra hook has potential to work against the others, never mind hurting the fish too. There are a couple ice fishing baits we use that hook horribly with the factory-rigged hooks. Cut them off and the bait hooks 'em every time and they're not coming off. Too many hooks can hurt your batting average just as bad as having too few!! |
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| You gotta respect the back hook, dress it up with a twistertail! |
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Location: Northern Wisconsin | i use barbless hooks and still end up cutting them sometimes. In stead of removing hooks completely i guess a better solution could be to use single hooks instead of trebles on some baits. |
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| I guess I never really put any thought into the hooks on the baits I buy. I'm sure in due time people will pride in using hookless lures just so no one hurts a musky they might possibly catch someday. It sounds kind of fun to try though, I haven't casted anything without hooks since I was 3 casting down my driveway but I bet it would be one heck of an accomplishment to coax the fish close enough to the boat to "land" it. Its doable with suckers, but I wonder if the reason it's easier is because it's live bait filet mignon. Artificials though...I think I just might screw around with no hooks and see what I can do with a ski. Who's with me! |
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| Welldriller, mag dogs are musky killers i believe. Caught 3 on them this summer and two were hooked in the gills and bleeding bad. Only 34 inchers. Caught over 20 muskies so far this year, only 2 bled, and both were on mag dogs. Good bait for hooking up, it's just they inhale the things and you end up killing fish on em' |
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Posts: 20263
Location: oswego, il | I think about hooks on my baits all the time. The right ones for the bait, how it will hook up and why a fish came off a bait. Give me three hooks on a bait bigger than 8" every time. Sure a musky can inhale a bait, they can completely miss it altogether too. I am musky fishing. I want the best possible chance to hook up with a fish. That is what I sent thousnads of dollars for .Eliminating a hook does not always work out the best on alot of baits. One of my favorite baits is about 7.5" long, very erratic and only has two hooks. No matter how the fish hits it, the bait is always outside the fishes mouth a second later, usually leaving a single hook point to get a hookup, hard to get a good hookset that way too. I catch some and lose more than I should if it would have three hooks on it. |
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Posts: 32935
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Are three hooks necessary?
Yes.
My 2 cents. |
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| See...you just said should. :s
The only thought about my hooks are if they are sharp or not, that makes the biggest difference out of any other hook up. The only fish that ever gave me the chance to see it "spit" a bait was one of the larger ones I've tangoed with in my time out. The top of my weagle was where the bottom should have been, and the hooks were in the opposite direction of the fishes mouth. I didn't have a chance to set the hook as I made a noob mistake and stood there staring in awe..however If I did I probably would have had a big weagle mark on my head |
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| I don't know how many of you have actually taken hooks off/or switched hooks on baits regularly to fit your specs...but I've found some run much better, while the action in others is completely bass ackwards from what it did with the original hooks. Either way, sometimes you hook them...some times you don't. I'll take the risk of wounding a fish, fishing...for all the crap they make me put up with. |
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Location: Latitude 41.3016 Longitude 88.6160 | 2 is all I fish, if a bait needs 3 hooks I don't fish it !!!! |
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Posts: 1220
| I do have one bait (Crane balsa) where I will take three hooks and make them into two, but it's only because the hooks are a bit smallish for my liking. Bigger hooks will make the bait sink (which violates the whole balsa thing) so if you want to get a slightly bigger hook on both ends, you need to sacrifice the one in the middle. Also, I too have had more then a few fish barely nip the last hook this summer as I make the first turn into a figure eight. In fact, I'd say it's been easily more than 50% figure eight fish this year--more shoppers than buyers! Marty Forman |
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| Always make sure you have a hook pick in the boat, also 13" articulating pliers are a huge help. You can ussualy get any deep hooked fish undone. |
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Posts: 929
Location: Rhinelander. | Kaz,I was not saying if I think they are or not! I was asking!!!!! You jump all over me for asking the question. On many baits I do not think 3 hooks are needed. I have many that I have replaced with two larger hooks and my hookups are fine.
My point is that a bait with 3 hooks is more likely to do damage to the gills if swallowed deeply. It is also more complicated to remove it if swallowed deeply. I think you all would have to agree with that. I think if you really take alook at alot of your baits and imagine the mouth of an essox on it you can see that in most cases two hooks would be enough.
Pfeiff
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Posts: 20263
Location: oswego, il | Don, I completely disagree. On most baits 3 hooks are just right. I can see it on some baits, 6-7" long with small hooks but muskies can engulf them too. Why would we spend as much money as we do and then go limit our ability to catch a fish? I suppose bait choice makes a difference too, I fish alot of erratic style baits and they are never engulfed. Last time I had a fish take a bait all the way in it's mouth was 3 years ago and it had two hooks.
Somebody already posted, we should all carry the right tools for those deeply hooked situations. |
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Posts: 941
Location: Freedom, WI | Todd and I have disagreed on this before. I think the most important part is that the hooks are wider than the body of the bait. So if the bait is thicker the hooks need to be bigger which limits how many can fit without tangling and tangled hooks do not catch fish. for me the best hook ups and staying hooked up (especially with erratic baits) is to add a split ring (like a chain) on the belly hook and drop the hook and rotate it. It also takes away the leverage that the fish gets when thrashing around. My baits are a little thicker and I size the hooks accordingly, on baits longer than 8" most of the time I can get 3 on. On the 10" I am working on it fits 3 |
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Posts: 4080
Location: Elko - Lake Vermilion | On Big Lures,... Yes, 3 hooks for me.
Crain Baits, ect., get only 2 larger hooks, and split rings . IMO.
Jerome |
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Posts: 829
Location: Maple Grove, MN | This is one reason I throw spinner baits so much. With just two single hooks, it is rare that the hooks ever hurt the fish. This can help make for very quick releases and that gets one back fishing quickly. In the past few years I have been focusing on getting really good and fast releases by using spinner baits more and keeping the fight as short as possible. A quick measurement, a quick picture and the fish is back swimming and we're casting again.
What we have found is that feeding windows are often no more than fifteen to twenty minutes and if one uses up that time on one fish, then that is all one will catch. So far this year I have two doubles and one triple when the fish were all caught within minutes of each other and have done that many other times in the past three years.
Just something else to think about.  |
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| kickin minnow have only 2 treble.i cant recall any missed fish,of course i had to upgrade the size of them |
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Posts: 1220
| The reason that the Kick'n Minnow seems to be more of a fish holder than a fish loser is the same reason that less fish are lost (more caught) on bucktails. It is, simply, because a lot of the stick baits become a "crowbar" in a muskies mouth. I think you have to do twice or three times the job of controling what is often a wild situation to counteract the effect of this "prying" action when a big piece of lumber joins with a menacing head shake to rip hooks right out of your fish. That's why nobody wants to give up the third trebble. In other words, you have to be a more competent angler. Let's face it, using a bucktail, Kickin'Minnow, smaller Dawgs, or many other soft-plastic alternatives is sort of like practicing "Musky Handling for Dummies" and I am totally satisfied to be one of the dummies who boats most of his fish. Marty Forman |
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Posts: 929
Location: Rhinelander. | Ty for the replies. Yes some of the bigger baits need 3 hooks. I just fell that there alot of the baits we use that would better serve our needs with just two bigger hooks. I alsi feel they would not cause as much damage to the fish.
I really like the kick'n minnow also. a great bait.
Pfeiff |
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