HOOKS: General

[John Pierce]

Fishing hooks have the following components:

• Eye: For tying on, can be straight called Ring Eye, turned up, or turned down (DE).
• Shank: The straight or curved section behind the eye.
• Bend: After the shank, semi-circle or elliptical.
• Barb: For retaining the fish, can be barbless for catch and release fishing.
• Point: Very tip of hook, sharp.
• Bite/Throat: Length from Point to middle of Bend, the effective depth of hook.
• Gape: Distance between the point and the hook shank

Fishing hook sizes are based on an antiquated system that doesn't make a lot of sense to us these days:

HOOK SIZE

• Is the measure of the gape of the hook.
• The number gets bigger as the hook gets smaller. A size 24 is an extremely tiny fly and a size 4 is a very large fly. After size 2 hook sizes go to 1/0, 2/0, and so on.

HOOK SHANK LENGTH
Is designated as 1X, 2X, 3X, etc, indicating that the hook shank is 1, 2, or 3 times the length of the gap (plus the width of the eye).

• 1X Short: Mostly used with nymph, scud, and egg patterns.
• 2X Long: Common for most basic flies, although many exceptions.
• 3X Long: Common for Streamer type flies.

HOOK WEIGHT
Is determined by the diameter of the wire:

• Extra Strong: For fish with super strength.
• 2X Heavy: Best for fishing in deeper water. Nymph and streamer hooks are made from a heavier wire so they sink faster.
• 1X Standard: General all purpose hooks.
• Extra Fine - Best suited for dry flies.

HOOK BEND

• Bait Holder: White-bread option for holding bait, can have long or short shanks.
• English Bait Hook: Curved hook with a straight bend near the point. Often used for San Juan worms or Caddis emergers. Can damage fish by becoming deeply embedded in the mouth roof, if taken too deeply it will penetrate the back of the brain and cause death to the fish.
• Egg Hook: This really isn't a bend as so much of a style. A typical egg hook is extra heavy wire, ring eye and a sproat bend. The shank is extra short.
• Model Perfect Bend: This shape is usually found on dry hooks and many streamer hooks. It is a round bend and it is sometimes called a Viking Bend also.
• Nymph Bend: These are newer shapes of hooks which are designed to make the fly appear more life like. Sometimes they have a bend shank in which the shank is bent at a 45 degree bend. Useful for bead type flies.
• Sproat Bend: Often used in wet flies, soft hackles and bass hooks. Some saltwater hooks have a sproat bend. This bend generally has a small turn or the point is sometimes given an upward slope in the point.
• Scud or Shrimp: Used for scuds, caddis emergers, bead flies and for some parachutes. The shape allows the fly to look like a turned down freshwater shrimp or cress bug. One of the more useful hooks.
• York Bend: This sometimes called a natural bend or living nymph hook. Often used on stoneflies, large nymphs or stimulator type flies. If it is blackened it can be a very useful steelhead and salmon hook.
• Circle Hooks: Hook is circular in shape, used primarily for live bait fishing, increase hooking percentages and also help to prevent gut hooking fish. When a strike occurs, the hook slides out of the fish's throat. The barb does not penetrate until the hook reaches the corner of the mouth. At that point, the hook point pivots and sets for a safe, solid hookup. The primary thing to remember about circle hooks is that they do not require a standard hard, hook set. In fact, setting the hook in that manner will almost guarantee that a fish is lost. Instead, simply cranking down and applying steady pressure works best.
• Continuous
• Limerick
• Oversize
• Sweeping
• York

HOOK COLOUR
Most common are:

• Black
• Bronze
• Nickel
• Gold
• Other colors include red, green and blue, etc ...

METAL ALLOYS
Metal alloys are extremely important, if you do see any flaws or the hook easily breaks, then switch brands.

• Carbon
• Steel
• Stainless steel

METAL COATINGS

• Chrome

HOOK POINT

• Spear Point
• Hollow Point
• Needle Point
• Rolled-in Point
• Knife-edge
• Diamond / Triangle Points
• Dublin Point
• Some have dual barbs on back of shank, like Matzuo Black Chrome Baitholder Offset DE from Walmart Canada.

TERMS

• Aberdeen: Long shank light wire bait holder.
• Octopus