favorite or best shark hook?

[13starsinax]

i really like circle hooks but here lately ive been getting long initial burst after the strike and giving plenty of time before really lifting the rod and reeling down on em. now back 10 years ago everything was still mostly j hooks and well sure i lost some but nothing like these circle hooks. and here in florida once your past state waters you better not have a j hook layin around. well any way if you fellers could share some of your insight i would again appreciate it.

[Squirmypug]

It seems like from what you said you may not have large enough hooks, with circle hooks you need to leave alot of the hook outside of the bait.Also when using circle hooks I like to use Owner and Gamakatsu.If your not using alot of drag try the thinner wire hooks, they seem to hook more often.If your having trouble getting the shark to get the hook in longer baits try a stinger hook.What I have been using the past few weeks is Gamakatsu Big Eye Circle on 350lb mono leader with another 7-8/0 circle as a stinger.You may also want to set the drag close to where you will fight the fish while its in the rod holder, don't pick up the rod untill its bent over and drag is screaming.This seems to work well with circles and keeps the shark from getting gut hooked. 

[wallacewt]

go here,scroll down to target hooks
www.fishingkites.co.nz
circle hook.
very good info!
straight eye
start snell at front of hook
lay tag end on back of shank
snell down 5 turns
cut tag end off
snell another 3 turns
return the trace end thru the eye from the back.
tie to swivel or whatever.
size of hook 6/0 for snapper as starting point.

[redsetta]

Funny you should refer to the Fishing Kites site Wallace - they're friends of mine and I do their reels.
Lots of good stuff on there....
All the best, Justin

[wallacewt]

small world with the internet,information keeps us all young,just gotta sort the wheat from the chaff.cheers

[mmmooretx]

A lot of the Kayak fishermen in Texas, http://www.texaskayakfisherman.com/, use 14/0-16/0 circle hooks with 400 lb. mono.  http://www.texaskayakfisherman.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=58&t=76584.

[alecriss]

I use Mustad 7699 and for me it's the best shark hook.Also sometimes I prefer using 2407ssd,8-9/0 in macks and 12/0 in blues..

[Three se7ens]

I use 9/0-12/0 typically when shark fishing, with an 8" bite leader of doubled 180 lb 7 strand wire, and a 7' leader of 300 lb mono.

If you are using circle hooks, you don't need to let it run for as long as with j hooks.  I start tightening the drag down within 5-10 seconds of it taking the bait. Don't bury your hooks too far into the bait, and use heavy drag get the hook set. Remember not to pop the rod, just steadily increase the pressure to set the circle hooks.

[saltydog]

We do a lot of shark fishing here in Texas and you have to match your hook to your bait size.A 6" mullet works good on a 5/0 a big mullet head on a 14/0 but whole rays or jack heads you need at least a 20/0 circle and always remember the hook has to be exposed.On big baits we slip a piece of wire through the eyes and bridle rig our big baits with the hook completely exposed.

[ChileRelleno]

I primarily do a lot of land based shark fishing.
I almost exclusively use the cheapest Mustad circles, and take the time to sharpen the points till they are needle fine.
As I like a lot of hook showing, the smallest hook I use is a 16/0 for nice steak or head of  Mullet, and I also use the 18/0 & 20/0.
Castable rigs are 16/0 on 3' of 135# nylon coated cable, double crimped, with 150# barrel swivel, another 1' section of cable for a sliding spider weight, another swivel and then the mainline (topshot).
The rest of my leaders are much larger mousetrap setups, 15-25' in length, big baits that are dropped by yak.
Drags are set for the fish to hook themselves, as stated before, rod bowed over and drag screaming.


Sharpnose on a 16/0


Scalloped Hammer on a 20/0
Mustad 20/0 39960D circle hook, 15' of 480# coated stainless steel cable, double crimped with copper sleeves, 550# Spro barrel swivel, 10' of SS cable with a sliding 600# AFW snap swivel with 8oz spider weight, to 550 lb. SPRO barrel swivel and mainline.

[Jeri]

Hi,

Circle hooks vs. J hooks??? This is a huge debate that it rambling on and the conservationists are pulling on the side of circles, as when they hook up it is in the corner of the mouth, and fish and sharks can be released with minimal damage to the fish – however!!!!

15 years ago, my wife and I did a huge amount of shark fishing from small boats, and found that with the sharks we were catching, both pelagic and demersal, that a modification to how we rigged our J hooks, seemed to offer improved mouth hook ups, and was only slightly dependant on hook size. We generally snelled our wire traces around the shank of the hook, with the wire coming into the eye from one direction, two turns round the shank of the hook then back out through the eye of the hook, on the opposite side to the entry, then pull it all tight, and crimp. This effectively 'stiff rigged' the hook – like the marlin guys do with lures. With baits mounted on the hook, but with as much point and bend exposed as possible then set to fish – rod in rod holder, and drag pushed up to strike. Leave the rod until the shark is pulling away against the drag, and we found our strike rate was very high, and nearly 95% were hooked in the corner of the mouth. The point was to have the hook point effective in the direction of the pull of the line, and not be able to be deflected, as might well happen with a traditional loop of wire through the hook eye – 'floppy hook' rig.

Then, through the early days of the UK Shark Tagging Program, we looked long and hard at circle hooks, and found that we had to change our strategy, as circle hooks firstly need to be rigged 'floppy', with an open eye to the loop of wire, as 'stiff rigged' they tend to have a much lower hook up rate when engaging the point to the fish or shark. Secondly, the big drawback was that the hook size is very critical to the size of the fish you will catch. Small circle hooks will not catch large fish, the critical issue is the distance between the point and the shank of the hook, when compared to the width of the side of the mouth of the fish or shark being baited. Too small on the hook, and it won't engage, too large, and they fish might have a problem getting the whole hook in its mouth. The 'too large' issue is not too much of a problem with big shark species, but can certainly be an issue with some of the smaller species. You can see this with the pictures from 'ChileRelleno', the Sharpnose on 16/0 might well have had a problem getting bait and hook into its mouth if it had approached the 20/0 + bait as used in the picture with the Scalloped hammerhead.

The very essential issue of circles is that the fish or shark must hook itself, and that means that the fish must pull against a sustained drag, for the hook to then try and pull out of the mouth of the shark, and then engage and turn to point first in the corner of the mouth of the fish, only then will the hook work. They were originally designed for use on long lines that were laid taught across the ocean floor tied to a backline that was between two anchors, the pull against the backline is what engaged the hook – no one there to strike the hook.

Another aspect that we did find with circle hooks is that they generally are made of quite thick wire, and need a lot of work to get the points down to surgical sharpness. Since the days of our boat fishing we have moved to Namibia where we do an aweful lot of shore fishing for sharks, and now we have come back to fine wire needle point J hooks, and in fact use a lot of Catfish style hooks in the larger sizes. These are fine wire, forged, and have surgical sharp points, and have switched back to knelling the hooks on with wire, and mounting the hooks well outside the baits. Our hook up ratios are very high, as well as 95% of sharks hooked in the corner of the mouth. There is no problem issue on size of hook, we have hooked sharks over 50kgs on 4/0 hooks, as well as much larger sharks on bigger hooks.

One issue that we have found to be very salient on all shark fishing is to leave the hook as proud as possible, even using rigs that mount the bait on a separate dropper wire that is slipped over the bend of the hook. The dropper wire is soft stainless steel, formed to make a small twisted loop at one end, then left plain at the other, so that bait can be pushed onto the needle like section, then the remaining section of the wire is bent up into the bait to secure it from falling off during casting. The hook is then passed through the little eye on the wire, and squeezed closed to secure it to the hook bend. The bait is now a body of enticement hanging off of the bend of the hook – nearly completely free of hindrance by the bait – open and ready for hook up.

At the end of the day, the best hook is the one that you have confidence in, and does the job for you.  Have always said that if you put a dozen shark anglers in a room with all the makings for rigs and baits you will end up with at least a dozen if not more variations on a theme to rig and mount baits, and all will have a good explanation. Here locally the local favourite is to use two J hooks fished Pennel style, with a sliding or fixed top hook, personally I have found that single hooks work just as well – it is a matter of confidence.

Hope that helps.

Cheers from sunny Africa

Jeri

[Fishnmike]

Great posts guys. I've been struggling with hooks on our much smaller sharks here in California.  Some days is leopards that run 3 to 5 feet in length. The next day its baby 7-gill and then the next its 6 ft plus soupfin.  There is always the chance for the 7 to 8 foot 7-gill.  There are always a ton of little sand sharks around.  I've settled on 10/0 Gamakatsu Big River hooks and some 10/0 Mustad J hooks that work pretty well but still deal with a lot of pull offs, where we obviously have a big shark on and its running but then pulls free.  Have played with circles but the various size sharks in addition to most of these sharks don't pick up a bait and run, they like to sit and chomp, havn't proven to be really effective for me.

[Bunnlevel Sharker]

I'll post pics of hooks tommorrow, probably start a new thread cause its a lot. For sharks I run everything from 7/0 circle sea ECs to 14/0 stainless J hooks

[UKChris]

Here in the UK I have used a whole range of different hooks on mainly blue sharks up to 120lb or so plus porbeagles up to 180lb. All work.
They include the Mustad Sea Master 7699 9/0-12/0, Sea Demon and Southern & Tuna in the same sizes; O'Shaughnessy 3406 and 3407 in 10/0 - 12/0, and 3407SS (2X strong, not stainless steel) in 11/0; Sea Mate 7698B in 9/0 to 12/0; Bay King 7734 in 12/0 - 14/0; Tarpon & Tuna 7692 in 12/0; Tuna Circle 39960 16/0 (a favourite) - 18/0 and the Tuna 9202R in 8/0 - 9/0.

I've also used hooks by Eagle Claw, VMC, Maruto, Milward and others all similar in design to the above.

The only hook that failed just once was a 3406 10/0 O'Shaughnessy that opened out enough to allow a decent blue to escape when being held hard and lifted on the leader. Maybe it was a nice clean release!

I know those fish of mine are a far cry from some of the beasts you lads wrestle with but I also have used many of these same hooks on some frisky blue marlin up to 800lb.

So, my favourites?

16/0 Mustad Tuna Circle 39960
9/0 Sea Mate from Milwards
10/0 Mustad Sea Master 7699

[Shark Hunter]

20/0 Mustad 39960D Tuna Circle Hook, 14/0 Eagle Claw Circle Sea, 16/0 tempered steel Infinity.
The 20/0 for Tigers, Bulls and Hammerheads. The 14/0's for Blacktips, smaller Bulls, Bonnetheads, Lemons etc. 16/0's for extra measure, Stingray baits.

Two rigs I made up tonight. 25' of 400 lb mono with a sliding trace (Rat trap as they are called) 480 lb cable double crimped and shrink wrapped.