YAK FISHING TIP # 29
BEND DOWN THOSE BARBS FOR YAK FISHING SAFETY

Treble hooks are dangerous to me and to the fish I bring aboard my yak. I crimp the barbs completely down. It is a lot easier to remove hooks from the fish and, in the event I get hooked, hook removal is far less painful if the hook has no barb.

A �Lap Dance� with a Ladyfish hooked on a 6 hook lure is terrifying. Been there-done that.

Yes, I lose an occasional fish that I might have landed with barbed hooks but I don�t expect to have to go to the ER to have one removed from my flesh.

I pull the fish into the deck on the left while I hang my left leg overboard to avoid barbs and spines.

Fish Grips + Pliers.

I have a hard enough time landing anything with a barb. Won't be smashing mine down. If I caught a bunch of skipjacks I may reconsider or more likely get a pair of lip grips and do the unhooking business off to the side

This! Trebles scare me, especially at night

Not what I thought this thread was going to be about! Thanks for the laugh, Captain

Really?

I got to spend a few hours 3 weeks ago at the hospital waiting for my buddy to get a treble hook removed from his thumb. He landed a beautiful 22" rainbow on a crankbait and he hauled it onto his yak with fish grips. When he began to remove the hook the fish flopped and impaled him. He sat there floating for a long time until I could reach him and cut the line to take the tension off the hook. The doctor at the hospital in Idabel said that he does about 30 hook removals a month. Be careful out there.

A few years ago I read a true account of a kayak angler who turtled his craft while landing a redfish. In a long, convoluted chain of events (I'm thinking it was a wintertime incident, but I'm not 100% sure) he ended up in the water with an overturned boat a long way from shore, alone, with a Superspook full of barbed treble hooks pinning one of his hands to his PFD. Granted, that's not a common experience, but it could happen. It's certainly worth consideration. He came out of it okay; he was lucky. As I recall, the point of that story was to encourage anglers to carry a wire cutter stout enough for his largest hooks.

Bend them all down always! You don't want to be out there trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey.
Fight the fish correctly and you will lose few fish.

I have thought more than once about fishing barbless hooks. I sunk this hook in pretty deep one hot summer afternoon when fishing alone. It was a long paddle back to the truck and it was not too easy to load my kayak and gear up with a hook in one hand. All followed by a long drive to the ER. If and/or when there is a next time I will try the hook removal using the monofilament line trick before going to have it cut out.

If you pull hard enough, it will come out.
Sometimes a lil meat comes out with it. No biggy

I ended up with a fish hook in my finger on Tuesday and discovered it is very hard to unhook a fish while hooked yourself. I would have removed it myself but since needed a tetanus shot and the clinic was only three miles away I went there. Unfortunately the doctor that was attempting to remove the hook was not experienced in doing that. After trying to pull the hook out, unsuccessfully of course, ended up pushing it through. Next problem was that they did not have any tools to cut the hook itself and ended up bending it back and forth until it broke. Need to remember to bend down the barbs, especially on treble hooks.

Since they were having problems I was trying to Google the mono line trick on my phone but did not have enough time. Need to commit this to memory for the next time it occurs since it would less painful to remove it myself instead of having an inexperienced doctor try it.