When I fished in heavily snagged places, along the Murray mostly but also down here in Melbourne and always nearly in Freshwater, ( except for 35 years ago at Patto River, the place was a swamp back then and full of snags, but ohh the Bream were Huge !!! ) I actually used to change my harder high carbon based trebles over to softer steel/bronze hooks, these were more than a match for any fish I was chasing but also I knew that If I applied enough pressure that I could bend and straighten the hooks on the lure and retreive my lure.
I would just take a spool of an old reel and wrap the snagged line around that so I had a straight pull from me to the snag and not through my rod or reel as I didn't want everything to break on me.
I used to lose over $100 lures a session, we all know how easy it is to get snagged and how expensive some lures are.
After about 4 sessions I got it down to costing me some new trebles which as most guys know I deal in tackle so its not a problem. Occasionaly I would still lose a lure, but no where as many as what it was.
Every session used to be 4-7 lures before I cried and gave up
Now if I know that we are going and I prepare I might lose an average of about .33, yep 1 out of every 3 sessions.
Changed a few hooks in that time, but whats the point of having the worlds strongest hooks on if its snagged ?
Do you actually need the Worlds strongest hooks to catch fish ? I don't know about you, but i know I have used a distorted and bent hook many times as I havent had the chance to change it during a hot bite and it lasted just fine through it all.
Sure good strong & sharp hooks are good to use, but do we really need a 4 x or even 2x strong hook when just a standard strength hook is all that is needed, in fact wanted as its normally thinner, sharper and penetrates easier.
Well thats my .20c for today, let me know what you think about it.
Do we need super strong hooks for every occasion ???
cheers
tacklenut
