Hey ya Kezz, a good hook has to be chemically sharpened and also stay sharp especially during a hot bite. It should be of a high quality carbon steel and have the strength to be set deep in a tough mouth and show no signs of wear & tear like flex or straightening. Ive also found that red coated hooks seem to work better for me than black or silver, strange this may seem but maybe it signals blood to a hungry fish?. There are many brands of good hooks out there but only one takes a beating and comes back for more, GAMMAKATSU . These hooks are as expensive as most on the market and I prefer 7-8/0 and man these things are leathal. These hooks suit my style of fishing, whole big baits straylined in any depth yeeaaahhhhaaa. SQUID.
Gidday there squid, havent see from you in a while.
I prefer Gamakatsu as well and dont use anything smaller than a 5/0 for snapper fishing, BUT..... when I have used smaller hooks such as 2/0 for trevs ... I have had gamakatsus snap on a big fish ...admittedly using heavy gear to get around snaggy stuff. I am not such a fan of Black Magic .. they rust too easy. Very strong though.
What do you guys think of straight and curved eyes... I tie a snood on Octopus hooks to give them a straight pull on the line ... but straight hooks like BM I use a uni knot. Or am I just being silly?
Another thing with hooks, I believe the hook up rate on a jig loaded with a treble is about half that of a large wide gape single... having experimented on hunderds of lure caught kahawai, no matter what you say I wont believe otherwise!
Mike
Mr. Squid, I like the color of your Gammies when the red color wear off. Looks like a surgical instrument. Yeah, they are sharp as but I feel the gauge is a little thick for light tackle.
Smudge, I would think hook with straight eyes are mostly for live baiting ?? If you use a uni knot, I would imagine you do not tighten the knot in order to give it a more natural presentation where the hook can still swing around ? Surprised to hear that Gammies in lower sizes would snap. I have B/M circle hooks in 2/0 snap on a stingray before, always on the gape. I have Mustad penetrators 8/0 bent out of shape sideways (not straighten out) in deepwater (40m) so I only use these in shallows.
I always snell my suicide hooks for the same reason. Are you saying that the wide gape hook is better than a normal suicide hook for kahawai lures in your experience ?
G'day
Yep smudge agree with you there - singles on jigs and lures definitely the way too go..especially widegap variety you talk about. I have found with trebles a) they damage the fish if you intend to release b) foul hook rate increases c) during the fight - the fish can often leverage the treble off, working against each other , and finally trebles are bloody dangerous if they were to fly out of a hardfighting rat king or sim @ the boat.
Hehe Joe - yeah don't know of any trick / technique too stop them (squid) inking all over the place. Good half an hour spent cleaning the boat on sunday is testimony to that mate!!!As is an adidas jacket ruined by the critters~~~~~~~~~~~~~dead right tho, taste makes up for their antics
I read all the former posts on this topic and agree with some opinion but disagree others so I thought I would offer my 2 cents worth.T
There are many hook brands on the market, many have some of the forementioned qualities by Kerren so it might be a matter of matchinmg the hook to the application i.e. horses-for-courses.
I don't like the cheapies, thats all they are - would you trust the fish of a life-time on a cheap hook that you have to sharpen out of the bag and throw away after just a little use? Consider too the costs involved in berley, bait,petrol, rod, reel, accomodation, boat etc etc and the higher costs of better hook brands becomes insignificant. I think anglers have this mindset that hooks have always been cheap low cost items, and despite the emergence of better quality hooks that will improve their fishing; they maintain this stubborn view.
Compare the top brands like Gammies & BM, BM are a heavy wire hook with lots of strenght but that heavy wire & big eye just rips up my pili and bonito baits. I find the fine wire Gammies are easy to sew into soft baits which we all use for snapper, ultimate strenght is not an issue. BM's rust too easily and do not last long, Gammies don't have that problem. Compare prices on say the 6/0 (most popular snapper size) BM 6/0's have 3 hooks for $5.50 while Gammies have 6 hooks for $5.00 - less than half the price! Guess what I prefer!!
The Penetrators seem to be too light for snapper especially in the larger sizes which tend to be used for larger fish. Have heard of too many breakages of these to tempt me, the big red would be a better all round hook.
Eagle Claw & VMC don't tempt me either. Neither are as sharp as some of the others and they have been on & off the market too.
Wasabi, Youvella and Kuhmo hooks are typical if the cheapies from Asia but if you compare the hooks per $ against the other brands, you might be surprised that they are not such good value after all. Toss in their poor quality e.g. poorly closed eyes, points bent out of shape, rusting etc. they do not represent good value nor reliability.
I value my fishing time too much to muck around so just pick up the Gammies which have a hook type for nearly every instance.
ChrisW, cost of boating for me is actually very low, and I would be a typical dinghy fisherman. Petrol for the boat would only come to 50 cents per trip, berley would be less than a dollar since I made it myself, and I use fresh baits too, so bait would be about $7 per trip.
But if I anchor in the wrong spot, the hooks would get snagged and a two hook rig would cost at least a dollar (penetrators). And it is in reefy areas that bigger fish hang out, so hook would be a sacrifice to catch fish, so keeping the cost of hooks down is important to me. On average I lose 6 hooks per 2 hour session. I believe that so long as the fish is connected to the line and it is played out patiently, penetrators should do the job nicely. Of course, I am talking about shallow water. In deep water, penetrators are definitely not suitable, and my favourite would be Gammies. Gammies are twice as expensive as penetrators so would drive up the costs in shallow water.
Joseph, based on what you have said, your trips are very inexpensive. The cost for the vast majority of fishos would be much more than yours. I feel although the attrition rate for terminal gear is higher in the shallows, the larger snapper found there will test hooks & gear to the max. Strong jaws & heavy bone are a real test for hooks and the lighter wire ones don't cut it for me.
For most fishos, 6 hooks lost per hour is only $5 per hour for the second greatest pleasure known to mankind, an acceptable loss.
Chris
Chris, point taken. Just wonder what's your greatest pleasure in life if fishing ranks next to it ? I would rank children to be the greatest....
Kerren, if I am not mistaken, do you get your gourocks hook from the place at Patiki Road in Avondale ?? That is really cheap for a pack of 100 hooks. I remember reading in a previous post of yours regarding Gourocks. I had checked out the place but did not go inside as it looks like a wholesale warehouse to me. Do they do retail ? Would be very interested to check out those hooks...... Can you get them anywhere else ?
Joseph...
You got it mate..re: Gourocks location and yes they do have a retail section!...get yourself in there, but set yourself a budget or your "bank manager" (wife) might get angry with you!...they have all sorts of goodies...from knives to marlin lures and back again!...
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