Striper Talk Striped Bass Fishing, Surfcasting, Boating - View Single Post

tlapinski · 08-18-2003, 02:39 PM

well, since i posted this yesterday, i have been thinking about why/when i started using siwash tail hooks. i fish the CT river in the spring for stripers. i throw pencil poppers ALOT. i was catching many of my fish with the rear treble snagged in the eye, back, and all over, but not the mouth. as much as it was nice to be catching, i felt bad at how some of the fish came out of the battle. about 3 or 4 years ago, i tried putting a big siwash on the tail in place of the treble. i put it with the hook pointing up, because the bass would explode from underneath and often come right out of the water with the plug in their mouth. my thought was that the single hook pointing up would snag the fish less initially, but still allow to hook up as the fish came back down with the plug. it worked perfect. i would guess that my ratio of fish hooked to fish landed even got better as i usually had a much more solid hook penetration than before.

i then transferred this plan to my surface plugs, and just kind of kept doing what i had done with the pencil poppers as far as orientation. i have not felt like it has hindered my hook ups, but i have not done any sort of side-by-side comparisons. i just might have to do that now, though.

lastly, i use siwash on the tail of needlefish. i prefer the point up on my needles for one reason, less points to get hung up on rocks. even though i always have a treble on the belly hook, it is just one less hook to get caught on rocks.

so, has anyone ever compared there hook-up results with someone else fishing in the same way/area, but with an opposite hook set-up?

08-18-2003, 02:39 PM	#10
tlapinski All up in the Interweb! iTrader: (1) Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: In the dog house. Posts: 5,205	well, since i posted this yesterday, i have been thinking about why/when i started using siwash tail hooks. i fish the CT river in the spring for stripers. i throw pencil poppers ALOT. i was catching many of my fish with the rear treble snagged in the eye, back, and all over, but not the mouth. as much as it was nice to be catching, i felt bad at how some of the fish came out of the battle. about 3 or 4 years ago, i tried putting a big siwash on the tail in place of the treble. i put it with the hook pointing up, because the bass would explode from underneath and often come right out of the water with the plug in their mouth. my thought was that the single hook pointing up would snag the fish less initially, but still allow to hook up as the fish came back down with the plug. it worked perfect. i would guess that my ratio of fish hooked to fish landed even got better as i usually had a much more solid hook penetration than before. i then transferred this plan to my surface plugs, and just kind of kept doing what i had done with the pencil poppers as far as orientation. i have not felt like it has hindered my hook ups, but i have not done any sort of side-by-side comparisons. i just might have to do that now, though. lastly, i use siwash on the tail of needlefish. i prefer the point up on my needles for one reason, less points to get hung up on rocks. even though i always have a treble on the belly hook, it is just one less hook to get caught on rocks. so, has anyone ever compared there hook-up results with someone else fishing in the same way/area, but with an opposite hook set-up?