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Barbless Hooks

Would anyone be willing to post a photo of a barbels mouth that has been damaged by a barbless hook? Judging by the strong opinions of those who think barbless hooks damage fish I'm sure they would have done their best to document this damage and willing to shre this with the angling community? I hear a lot of criticism of barbless but no firm evidence on the matter.

I still think those who argue that barbless are damaging fish always start from the basis that they think they will drop more fish using barbless and the 'hook moves around in the fishes mouth' argument is the best theory to suit that angle. I use barbless for all of my fishing on mainly barbless venues and have never seen any evidence of barbless hooks doing damage to the fish, nor barbed for that matter. It is the anglers using them that sometimes cause damage to fish, and that sadly is an unavoidable part of angling.
 
i personally haven't took any pictures of a barbels mouth damaged by a barbless hook!
all i've got to say is its not something i brag about damaging a fishes mouth:( i shared my experience,as i thought it was my duty to advise fellow anglers of my opinion.
did none of you barbless anglers not use barbed hooks in the pre barbless days?
why did you change?
i'll tell you why because you read it!

as anyone took a picture of a barbel caught using a barbed with mouth damage?
 
John Charlton said:
i personally haven't took any pictures of a barbels mouth damaged by a barbless hook!
all i've got to say is its not something i brag about damaging a fishes mouth:( i shared my experience,as i thought it was my duty to advise fellow anglers of my opinion.
did none of you barbless anglers not use barbed hooks in the pre barbless days?
why did you change?
i'll tell you why because you read it!

as anyone took a picture of a barbel caught using a barbed with mouth damage?
Click to expand...

It wouldn't be bragging at all, surely that would further aid your opinion? I have been photographing some tench recently that have shown signs of not being at all well on a local pit, split fins, cysts etc, because of a genuine concern for the fishes welfare - I have never seen a photo showing the horrendous damage done by barbless hooks. I'm not saying anyone here doesn't care about fishes welfare here, I think this thread shows exactly the opposite to be honest, but it does seem to me the barbed camp have very strong, sometimes condescending opinions based on very little evidence at all.

As a younger angler myself I have never changed from barbed to barbless as I have used barbless nearly all the time I have been fishing, and have never experienced any problems with them. I did once cause damage to a gudgeons mouth by removing a whisker barbed hook which I was horrified about, but that wasn't because it was a barbed hook, but because I was then inexperienced and not an entirely competent angler.

And no I have never taken a picture of a fishes mouth damaged by a barbed hook, because I believe it is anglers themselves who cause damage not the hooks they are using.
 
Chris/John.. I used barbed hooks for many years, fishing pools, small rivers, and the Severn. Not liking the fact that barbed hooks made a bigger hole when they were being removed from a fishes mouth than the hole made via original penetration, I changed to micro-barbs as soon as they came on the market.
But I still had concerns about unhooking 'deep-hooked' fish e.g. small eels, small perch. This CAN be a nightmare with barbed hooks, but maybe others disagree?
I actually started using barbless by mistake. I'd bought what I thought were some new barbed hooks and it was only after a sucessful day's barbelling on the Severn that I noticed that my hook had been barbless. The next time I went fishing I intended to use barbless again, but after bumping off the first two fish I lost confidence in my hook. On checking its sharpness I noticed I'd put a barbed hook on by mistake! I changed it to a barbless, and have not used barbed hook since then.
 
Chris Summersell said:
because I believe it is anglers themselves who cause damage not the hooks they are using.
Click to expand...

Well i can say i've seen that happen, a couple of years back, i was approching an angler to check his permit, who was just in the process of unhooking a Barbel, in the 20 or 30 secs or so it took me to reach him, i noticed it was taking a long time to extract the hook which he appeared to be having difficulty with, when i reached him i bent down to get a better look, and i could plainly see what the problem was, he had a huge chunk of flesh clamped between the hook and forceps, with which he was twisting this way and that in an effort to remove the hook which appeared to him to be well and truly stuck in, i won't repeat my comments, but his excuse was that he'd left his reading glasses in the car, :mad:

Ian
 
Hi Ian,

A few years ago, I witnessed a truly horrific scene when an obviously novice angler was virtually butchering a 20lb+ pike in his efforts to remove deeply seated barbed trebles. The fella was a typical 'All the gear but no idea' type, though I think my 'carefully chosen' words embarassed him enough to have made a lasting impression...which hopefully might have saved the lives of any future pike he hooked.

As it happened, I did manage to remove the hooks from his victim in double quick time, using the time honoured methods (despite them being barbed), but sadly I doubt the fish survived the previous treatment it had received.

My point here being that had he been using barbless hooks, even he could have removed them in a reasonable time, and safely returned the fish to fight another day. At the worst, if the fact that it was deeply hooked unnerved him, he could at least have cut the trace short and released the fish, whereby it could probably have rid itself of barbless hooks and so survived. Not the best idea, but better than virtually killing it on the bank, as he had done, simply because he struggled so much, and for so long, to remove the wretched barbed hooks :mad:

Cheers, Dave.
 
Terry Christopher said:
That wouldn't happen with barbless :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

How's that ? the reason that the hook wouldn't come out was was because he had a lump of the fishes lip in the grip of the forceps as well as the hook.
Unless you're saying he wouldn't need the forceps in the first place, which i'll concede.
But barbless or not you get some right idiots using forceps, and i will concede that damage can be caused by their incompetant use. If people are going to use them they need to learn (ask someone who knows) how to use them with the correct technique.

I've never once had to resort to using them on a Barbel.

Ian.
 
Dave,
It's late and i wrote a post replying to yours, posted it and was greeted with a message to log in !!! :mad: may be tomorrow..... basically i agree with what you've said with regard to Pike and Perch

Ian.
 
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