My thoughts on hook sets and pegged unpegged weights

[mrbassky]

Everyone knows you hook more fish with an unpegged sinker

not everyone...

If you could scientifically separate a reasonable sample of bites with each scenario, you might be able to draw a conclusion...

The biggest problem with your train of thought is that your position requires that the hook gap be less than the diameter of the weight and that the hookset be in a straight line at jaw level which can't happen.

I would still counter that your argument, even if it were true, does not account for the fact that in cover you will get more bites with the pegged sinker. (since you spend less time hung and do not disturb fish in the area) not to mention that you have a straight line connection with a pegged weight... with unpegged, the fish can take the bait off in any direction and the weight's position could create slack on the hookset.

Oh, and any argument on hooking should consider hook design and the relative position of hook point to eye. It does matter.

You guys are missing the point. I am not say dont peg your weight in very heavy cover. You cant detect bites if its not pegged in the real thick stuff and you will have alot of slack in your line. I read for example one time Harlod Allen talking about worm fishing and the guy with the unpegged weight might catch %20 more over a day fishing fairly open water. I have caught small bass on a shakey head where the weight of the jig head was sticking out of the fishes mouth, as the hook was penetrating the weight of the jighead opened the mouth slightly. The fish bite down so hard its not forcing the mouth wide open but if its a small fish and the weight hits the lips before hook is finished penetrating or started penetrating then its not rock science the sinker has to go somewhere. Like I said pg 50 Nov-Dec FLW 08 I am not the only one who believes this SOMETIMES affects hooksets. Only with smaller fish and only a fraction but sometimes you gotta peg and you can avoid it by not snap setting. Just my 2 cents

[Bassin_Fin@tic]

Yea FISH A JIG ;D

Another disagree,sorry. You can't quite put a jig,any jig,into the places where you can put a slender low profile craw worm,tube,creature.

Huh and to think I have been doing it for 30+ years

Wow Catt!

And to think you've been doing it wrong all these years...

Come to think of it, I might have done that a time or two myself.

:

See that opening beyond the lily pads in the buck brush kinda to the left & behind the flowers?

I can put a jig or un-pegged Texas Rigged Lizard in there!

Still aint had no one answer my questions

So you can fish it THROUGH that brush,not around it,or how bout hydrilla and milfoil mats without it getting gunked up?

Nice banter by the way.To each his own :

[Catt]

Well first off I know Harold Allen fished against him many times; he's beat me & I've beat him. So let me tell you how it works quite often what you read aint what they are doing. I fish a Texas Rig on Toledo Bend a lot & it doesn't matter if you peg or not you will see teeth marks on your bullet weight but the hook is buried home.

With an un-pegged bullet weight depending on the depth of water you are fishing your worm at most will only be 12-18 behind you weight when it hits bottom. On the first pump, lift or what ever you call it the weight & hook are together; unless you are lifting your worm several feet off the bottom they will stay together within an inch or two. It is a widely held misconception the worm & bullet weight remain 3-5' apart when fishing a Texas Rig; this is pure & utter nonsense.  

Bassin_Fin@tic

I will flip into that buck brush, matted Hydrilla, Milfoil, Coon Tail with absolutely no problems; I caught 7 bass over 10 lbs & 100s of keepers using this technique.

So yes I can

[Muddy]

Hey Bassin_Fin@tic I use either the Lucky Srike Shaky head or the Finesse jib by them or especially SLIDER JIG HEADS, With either an *** Brush bug or 7 in.Ripper worms, and it comes through Coontail,millfoil and what have you with out fouling up.

[Bassin_Fin@tic]

Not trying to be a jack@ss. Sometimes you can only learn things by arguing with people,if your a little thickheaded like me sometimes, of course.

RW you use that roll eyes smilie too much :  8-)

[roadwarrior]

Do not!

...Do too!

Do not!

...Do too!

Okay, now that's out of the way. After re-reading this thread, it seems

the point mrdassky was making regarded hooking little fish...So, sorry

guys...I don't care.

--->  :  <---  You're welcome!

[J Francho]

You guys are missing the point. I am not say dont peg your weight in very heavy cover. You cant detect bites if its not pegged in the real thick stuff and you will have alot of slack in your line. I read for example one time Harlod Allen talking about worm fishing and the guy with the unpegged weight might catch %20 more over a day fishing fairly open water. I have caught small bass on a shakey head where the weight of the jig head was sticking out of the fishes mouth, as the hook was penetrating the weight of the jighead opened the mouth slightly. The fish bite down so hard its not forcing the mouth wide open but if its a small fish and the weight hits the lips before hook is finished penetrating or started penetrating then its not rock science the sinker has to go somewhere. Like I said pg 50 Nov-Dec FLW 08 I am not the only one who believes this SOMETIMES affects hooksets. Only with smaller fish and only a fraction but sometimes you gotta peg and you can avoid it by not snap setting. Just my 2 cents

Are you kidding me?  Dude, you've got to come up with better anecdotal evidence to fit the article you read than a fish so small, a 1/4" jighead forced its jaw open!

When fishing for these, you're going to get a couple of drops, LOL:

I see RW beat me to it, with a much more eloquent post

[Tin]

Walk away....just walk away.....

[flechero]

The fish bite down so hard its not forcing the mouth wide open but if its a small fish and the weight hits the lips before hook is finished penetrating or started penetrating then its not rock science the sinker has to go somewhere.

I believe that when you do your part correctly, the weight clears the jaw before the hook begins to penetrate, regardless of the fish size. Yes there are a few exceptions but they are just that- exceptions. If you are hooking most your t-rig fish so deep that the weight is still in his mouth when you get him in, you might want to go back and read the high end rods thread. ....lol

[Grey Wolf]

no more.

[Garnet]

Larry Nixon believes you can miss fish by pulling a worm wieght threw the lips so discounting it would be ahhhhhhh not smart.

Then the only way to set the hook is to have a fish open there mouth an  shake there head when angler is appling pressure. You can prove this by holding any bait in your hand tightly and have a trusted ? friend pull with a fishing rod. Do not open your hand thats when the hooks will get you.

Comparing 1/4 t rig  in scattered grass to punching mat with 1oz worm wieghts is..............

And the answer is have a settup that you can adjust between free and pegged and that would be bobber stops.

Now why would jigs hook better than trigs.

Garnet

[flechero]

No offense to Larry Nixon or the OP but if they were right, my 20+ years of pegging a t-rig wouldn't have been very successful... and the funny thing is that it's my strong suit. Even funnier is that the small fish thing keeps coming up. I guess you could be right, though.... I have yet to land a Bass over 11.5 lbs on a t-rig. :

I'm out of this one.

[Garnet]

I've 26 years tournament experience and success and never stopped learning.

The next time you miss a fish on a trig look at the wieght, see those scratches. Guess what happened.

Garnet

[flechero]

We just have very different experiences...  I can honestly say that my misses are very few and far between.  When using lead, I get the teeth marks on all the time, as in nearly every fish.  It proves nothing except that I set the hook on a closed mouth bass... which I would venture to guess is 99% of the time.

I have fished unpegged side by side and in the same brush piles as pegged... I catch a lot more fish pegged and hang up way less.  

[Muddy]

Not trying to be a jack@ss. Sometimes you can only learn things by arguing with people,if your a little thickheaded like me sometimes, of course.

RW you use that roll eyes smilie too much : 8-)

Man you are far from a Jackazz! Mook maybe ;D I am just as hard headed as you. The beauty is That Catt will stick with you until you can feel what he's saying. He being  open minded and not stubborn himself

[Catt]

I've got 38 years tournament experience with 25+ tournament wins and like flechero when using lead weights I always have teeth marks. The way I look at it is if I stick a 4/0 hook in the roof of your mouth you gonna open up to. My point is there is absolutely no way to determine why you missed a bass and yes it could very well be the weight forced its mouth open.

Some people like pegged some people do not; some people are successful with pegged and some people are successful with un-pegged. There are no best ways only personal preferences.

No disrespect flechero but I'll take that challenge of un-pegged vs. pegged ;D

Oh yea! Muddy I'm a Cajun & we aint known for being stubborn or hard headed

[Garnet]

Now we are fishing brush and I would peg my sinker by slidding the bobber stop tight then move to outside weedlines were unpeg will work better, just slide that bobber stop up 3-4" and keep fishing. This also sets up a chase seen. Worm chasing worm wieght.

Now with a bobber stop above and below the worm wieght I can Crig into even deeper water.

And then fish the next brush pile by readjusting the same settup.

I will take adjustable and tungston because my water demands that I adjust.

Now back to the hookset the most important thing is the hook. Heres your experiment take ewg stlye hook and but between your hands like praying now get somebody to pull the line. What do you feel.

Now take a jig style hook and do the same thing.

Garnet

[flechero]

No disrespect flechero but I'll take that challenge of un-pegged vs. pegged

no problem, it wasn't a challenge, it was just a statement of my past experience.  Poor wording by me, I meant that I fished 2 identical rods, except one was pegged.  I did the side by side several times... pegged was better for me every time.  Sounds like unpegged would win in your hands...   Sort of my point, no one way is best for everyone.

Garnet,  what's your point?  Holding hooks in my hand does not replicate a fishes mouth.  I would feel the same thing with any hook as long as the shank doesn't clear my hand. (but I use Owner wide gaps which have a very different design than EWG)  Once it does, with any of the hooks, I'll feel the point, unless the string angle is in line with the hook.  But in fishing, you are always above the fish so there is almost never a straight line pull.

I don't see what the argument is about.  There are lots of us that peg and some of us are pretty decent fisherman... do you think we are all liars or just very consistently lucky?  Think about jigs... they are pretty similar to a t-rig in this argument... if the weight caused you to miss all the time, the jig would be the worst lure on earth.

Pegged just works better for me, and some others...  You obviously won't change your position, and I'm firmly planted in mine.  I'm going to step down now.  

[Bassin_Fin@tic]

There is no technique or lure that will give 100% hookups always and some of it depends on just how the fish are biting. Are they sitting there not moving after gently sucking it up or are they grabbing and running. Either way I think it is safe to say that no-one has noticed any change in overall hookups.

[Catt]

If one examines mrbassky original here's what you get

"Everyone knows you hook more fish with an unpegged sinker but do you guys know why? The reason is that when a fish eats you pegged bait he gets the weight in his mouth as well. So how does that matter you ask? Well when you set the hook the sinker hits the fishes mouth. Grasp a texas rig in you hands with the line between your fingers and pull the line (not hard) the first thing you fell is the sinker hitting your fingers. This forces the bass mouth open most times which causes the hook to skin hook the bass and not penetrate as deep."

These are incorrect statements on several levels with the first being a large percentage of the time when a bass even a small one inhales a Texas Rig the weight is inhaled along with the bait and hook.

How is that possible if the bullet weight and hook are separated? Because they are not separated by a substantial distance once you have made your first lift.

The speed of your hook set coupled with the design of your hook will drive the hook home now if you're one of those people who hesitate after felling the bass inhale your bait then your odds of the bass spitting your bait greatly increases.

Now on to the subject of hang-ups with pegged or un-pegged weights

It does not matter which setup you are using if your line ends up in a crack in the wood, over the top of a stump that is jagged because the tree fell due to old age and was not cut down, or your line ends up in a tight fork of a branch the odds are you are going to get hung.

When I'm fishing matted Hydrilla, Milfoil, Coon Tail Moss I'm using a 1-1 ½ ounce weight which is sufficient enough to penetrate the vegetation pulling the bait with it provided the plastic does not have appendages or a tail long enough to wrap the vegetation.

When I'm casting with an un-pegged bullet weights while using plastics with appendages and/or a tail long in timber, brush, or vegetation experience has taught me how to shake my rod tip while applying sufficient pressure to cause the bait to free it's self often resulting in a vicious strike from a bass that has been alerted to all the commotion.

[Garnet]

Well you did get my point think about jigs and how the hook rotates. Thats was in my first post.

The ewg you will feel the round part of the hook opening your hands up.

Your hook choice is 2nd best check out Daichi copperhead as you will see it's a jig hook with a little longer 90 degree thats more rotation. Now hold that between your hands any angle that you like.

Now that we have the 2 best hooks the pegged vs unpegg and weather a fish opens it's mouth before hooking is wear it allways should have been a 1% problem.

Garnet

[mrbassky]

WOW!! The purpose of my post was to explain why I thought unpegged weights hook more fish. I peg my weight when fishing around cover and the thicker the cover the closer I put my weight to the lure. I never said hook selection didnt matter I think its alot more important to the hookup % thank peg/unpeg selection. Obviously you can catch alot of fish on pegged rigs. With the right hookset there isnt much difference in hooksets. I think alot of people took it as I was saying they should be pegging their sinkers and thats not the case. Great Discussion

[The_Natural]

I wholeheartedly agree that pegging sinkers can impede hooksets.  I'm referring mainly to pegging EWG hooks.  I first noticed it with the introduction of the gambler screw-lock weights.  I still peg sinkers at times because it is needed, but use a harder hookset when I do, and try and use straight shank or offset round bend hooks.  EWG hooks have a hook point in-line with the line tie, and generally stick bass closer to the lips.  Straight shank hooks, offset round bend hooks, and obviously jig hooks have the hook point well above the line tie.    When Texas rigging; a lot of times part of the hook is sticking out of the fishes mouth....meaning the eye of the hook and part of the shaft is sticking out of its mouth with the hook in his lip or roof of his mouth.  If the sinker is pegged to the hook....that means your sinker must force the fishes mouth open, and can cause the hook to come out before it sticks.  This doesn't happen every time, or even 'all the time', but extensive use of each has made it pretty apparent to me.  

[tyrius.]

You can prove this by holding any bait in your hand tightly and have a trusted ? friend pull with a fishing rod. Do not open your hand thats when the hooks will get you.

This experiment is only valid if the friend is standing above the person holding the bait.  The two people can not be on the same level for a valid comparison.  If they are then the hook set is not the same as it would be when setting the hook on a fish in the water.

[The_Natural]

If one examines mrbassky original here's what you get

"Everyone knows you hook more fish with an unpegged sinker but do you guys know why? The reason is that when a fish eats you pegged bait he gets the weight in his mouth as well. So how does that matter you ask? Well when you set the hook the sinker hits the fishes mouth. Grasp a texas rig in you hands with the line between your fingers and pull the line (not hard) the first thing you fell is the sinker hitting your fingers. This forces the bass mouth open most times which causes the hook to skin hook the bass and not penetrate as deep."

These are incorrect statements on several levels with the first being a large percentage of the time when a bass even a small one inhales a Texas Rig the weight is inhaled along with the bait and hook.

I've gotta disagree with ya catt.   Texas rigged baits are generally inhaled by fish on the fall....and when a bait is falling with an unpegged bullet sinker, the weight is at least a couple of feet below the bait.   When your 'bait' hits bottom....it is actually just your sinker.  Your bait is a couple of feet behind it and flutters down to the bottom after a few seconds.