Striped Bass Fishing Tackle

Fishing Hooks for Striped Bass

Fishing for bass is a fantastic sport – even without the beer I could spend hours on the lake tempting the fishies to take my hook. If there is a low point to the sport, it’s when you have what you know is going to be a trophy fish nibbling on your line and it gets away. Sure, the story is fun, but a picture would be even better.

Using a regular fishing hook when bass fishing isn’t always the way to go. These aren’t just trout you’re going for here; these are bass.

Even when I’ve had bait “securely” set on the hook, those tricky little stripers have had me sit for 10s of minutes with nothing but a hook in the water. I have finally figured out how to keep the deep-water (40′) fish on the line instead of just feeding them my bait.

I start with frozen anchovies – buy them frozen solid and they will be about right by the time you get to the lake and are ready to start fishing. Of course you will want to keep them on ice – once they thaw they will fall apart while you are loading them up.

Type of hooks I prefer:

1. Single barb. If you are using this type of hook, make sure it’s sturdy and curved more than a regular fishing hook. Something like the J&M sickle hook works well. I would only use about 1/3 of an anchovy for this. Anything more and the bass with pull off the meat of the anchovy while working on the ends.

2. Double barb. This type of hook allows you to better secure your bait and keep it on the hook. This hook will keep your bait from rolling or sliding off better than a single barb hook. I recommend using about half an anchovy on this bad boy. It is easy to rig and easy to remove from your bass once caught. This is my preferred hook, but it’s getting pretty hard to find.

3. Triple barb. This type of hook, or treble, really holds the bait on. I would use half an anchovy for this one too. The only drawback to this is the amount of time it takes to remove the hook from your fish. There have been times when the fishing was so hot I actually just cut the line and re-hooked rather than take the time to remove the hook from the bass. I recovered the hooks at cleaning.

Using the hooks I’ve recommended here can help ensure that your bass fishing trips are successful and that you come back with dinner instead of a story about the ones that got away.

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