The merits of using barbless hooks

[gkieser]

You're right Chris.

I watched Kevin C take a couple of fish in a row on friday afternoon and they all jumped and went mental and none of the hooks pulled out on the jump, or when one of the fish jumped out the water onto a rock and then wriggled his way back into the water. The hooks weren't barbed so you'd have expected him to loose at least one of them.

[ShaunF]

Chris,

You know the thing is, I don't think you can rightly blame the hook removal process and barbs for all the damage caused to a fishes mouth. Such is the nature of a hook and of the act of fighting a fish, that in some cases damage to the fish is inevitable, barbless or not. The fish you guys are catching in the streams and rivers are delicate little buggers. Applying pressure to the hook during the fight has got to result in some tearing, depending on where the fish is hooked. Also, with the way those little buggers fight to get free, generally never staying still for a second and jumping around all over the place, means they get hurt quite easily.

As I explained in my previous post, I do still fish barbed on some of my flies, however I reckon on around 6 out of 10 fish I catch, I actually don't physically have to remove the fly from the fishes mouth, it comes out by itself during netting. The rest are easily removed, simply by reversing it out the way it went in, no drama. In fact I actually can't remember the last time I struggled to get a hook out, to the point that my forceps are lying in the bottom of my bag. I think.

Point is, I don't reckon the barb isn't solely to blame for injuring your little fishy friends ! I imagine that fly fishers down in the Cape of all places are well aware of the C&R rules and thus probably fish barbless as do you. And yet you still say you see fish down there with damaged mouths, bits of skin trailing etc. I reckon its more from them being played too hard or poor handling of them prior to release that does most of the damage.

[phly]

i recommend giving it a try...you get better at fighting fish too i.e. keeping contact etc...KZN fish are dirty bastards, you're right Shaun! Good call on the hooks not being solely to blame..there're some real idiots out there that fight fish for too long in warm water (lactic acid build up), hold fish out of water for ages for pictures, throw fish back into the water, wipe the slime off the buggers before releasing them etc..I think we could go on for ages waying up pros and cons of barbless...to me the pros far outweigh the cons, but that's my opinion. It really doesnt matter in the bigger scheme of things and it's up to personal preference, as long as the fish are cared for correctly and ensured the best survival chance if they are to be released.

[Chris Shelton]

Barbless fishing can only make a better fisherman out of you, as it teaches you to stay in contact with your fish at all times. I never blame the hook when I lose fish, I only blame myself for k@k hookups and sloppy line control, which, if anything, just serves to make me more determined to do it right the next time!

[Chris Shelton]

Chris,

You know the thing is, I don't think you can rightly blame the hook removal process and barbs for all the damage caused to a fishes mouth. Such is the nature of a hook and of the act of fighting a fish, that in some cases damage to the fish is inevitable, barbless or not. The fish you guys are catching in the streams and rivers are delicate little buggers. Applying pressure to the hook during the fight has got to result in some tearing, depending on where the fish is hooked. Also, with the way those little buggers fight to get free, generally never staying still for a second and jumping around all over the place, means they get hurt quite easily.

As I explained in my previous post, I do still fish barbed on some of my flies, however I reckon on around 6 out of 10 fish I catch, I actually don't physically have to remove the fly from the fishes mouth, it comes out by itself during netting. The rest are easily removed, simply by reversing it out the way it went in, no drama. In fact I actually can't remember the last time I struggled to get a hook out, to the point that my forceps are lying in the bottom of my bag. I think.

Point is, I don't reckon the barb isn't solely to blame for injuring your little fishy friends ! I imagine that fly fishers down in the Cape of all places are well aware of the C&R rules and thus probably fish barbless as do you. And yet you still say you see fish down there with damaged mouths, bits of skin trailing etc. I reckon its more from them being played too hard or poor handling of them prior to release that does most of the damage.

I don't quite buy into that Shaun, there is no way a barbless hook will tear chunks out of a little fish's mouth if one is fishing with light tackle and not striking but lifting into the fish. I have seen guys strike a fish so hard that the fish has literally flown over their head and landed downstream of them. This is definitely not necessary. The mark of a good fisherman is one who can lift into a 2 inch rainbow without plucking it out of the water when it grabs the fly.

[gkieser]

On occasion I have used a store bought fly and forgotten to remove the barb before fishing it, and I can tell straight away when I try remove the hook from a fish's mouth that it is not de-barbed, and usually the forceps have to come out.

[ShaunF]

Barbless fishing can only make a better fisherman out of you, as it teaches you to stay in contact with your fish at all times.

Chris, if you read my posts carefully, you will see that I'm actually not arguing with you at all. On small river fish, barbs can certainly do damage. All I'm saying is that so can a lot of other things, like striking too hard, bad handling etc In those cases it doesn't matter what kind of hook is being used, the fish will still be injured.

The fact that so many guys in the cape fish totally barbless and yet you are still finding fish with mouth damage bears this out.


Lets talk again about staying in contact with your fish at all times when a 13lb rainbow burys you in the weed so deep that your mate has to paddle out in his floattube and drop an anchor to try and free it.

[ShaunF]

I don't quite buy into that Shaun, there is no way a barbless hook will tear chunks out of a little fish's mouth if one is fishing with light tackle and not striking but lifting into the fish. I have seen guys strike a fish so hard that the fish has literally flown over their head and landed downstream of them. This is definitely not necessary. The mark of a good fisherman is one who can lift into a 2 inch rainbow without plucking it out of the water when it grabs the fly.

You just inadvertantly confirmed exactly what I was saying in the first place. Its not just the hooks, but a multitude of other things that cause damage. If you fish barbless and still strike like a palooka, you're still going to damage the fish.

Read again, carefully this time.

[Chris Shelton]

On occasion I have used a store bought fly and forgotten to remove the barb before fishing it, and I can tell straight away when I try remove the hook from a fish's mouth that it is not de-barbed, and usually the forceps have to come out.

Exactly! Ripping a barbed #14 hook out of a 6 inch fish's mouth is equivalent to removing a #6 barbed hook from a bigger fish's mouth. You try removing a barbed hook that is even lightly hooked out of your finger and tell me how much you appreciate that. I don't see any difference

[ShaunF]

On occasion I have used a store bought fly and forgotten to remove the barb before fishing it, and I can tell straight away when I try remove the hook from a fish's mouth that it is not de-barbed, and usually the forceps have to come out.

2 words. Cheap hooks.

Never had this problem using TMC's, they have a very fine barb.