Andy95

Yeah i figured. I spent time trying to tie my rigs so that they naturally stay facing up lol. But yeah that doesn't work, hook still turns. Thanks for the reply man.

This picture hopefully shows what i mean. The hook turns down and slides between the gills and hooks the fish there. No idea what i am supposed to do to prevent that from happening but yeah..it's happened 2 times now. Thanks.

To clarify what happened. My hook point turned down. It turned down and hooked the fish between a gill in his lower body. My hook wasn't swallowed. The hook didn't pierce a gill. It pierced between the gills at the bass's body. The hook point pointed down and hook the bass between the gills in his lower body. I actually just came back from fishing and it happened again with a ned rig. The hook point turned down fell between his gills and the hook punctured the bass's lower body where the gills connect again. I hope you guys get what I mean. It started to bleed. This time I had my pliers and got the hook out and put it back in the water. I let it rest a bit and it swam away. I stared at that cove for 15 mins to make sure i didn't see a bass float up and I didn't. So hopefully it didn't die. It was the biggest one i caught for the day probably 2 - 2.5lbs. But I didn't want it to die so I didn't take a photo or weigh it. I'm not sure if there is any way for me to prevent my hook from pointing down and hooking something below. Most of my hook sets penetrate the upper lip of the mouth. I hooked a fish today with a texas rig and it penetrated the lower lip. So my hook point turned down again. except this time i got lucky and I did a clean hook set on the lower lip instead of the gill. But to clarify the problem I have is my hook sometimes turns down and slides between the bass's gills and punctures the lower part of the basses body where the gills connect. This has happened two times. This is the only time i cause a bass to bleed. I have never had a bass swallow a hook.

I kept taking him in and out of the water or trying to take the hook out with the fish in the water. The hook was just wedged in real good. Pliers would have taken care of it. Not sure if the fish would have died anyways because it was bleeding excessively. But was my fault for not checking for my pliers. Thanks

I saw a guy fishing with his kids and they were using bait so I walked up to him and asked if he was fishing to keep and eat, said yeah so I offered asked him if he wanted the bass i caught and took it. You're right i did not want to waste. Though it's lake pleasant in Arizona. I'm sure an eagle would have scoped it out of the water.

I got into fishing June 2020. I have been seriously enjoying all my time out on my local lake. For a while I mainly just used a spinning rod and stuck with a drop shot or wacky rigged worms. I just bought my first baitcaster (an slx combo) and just started using the texas rig. I caught a few bass and the hook always went in the top part of the bass's mouth. Yesterday I detected another bite and set the hook. When I lifted the fish out of the water i could see he was bleeding from the gill area. My hook point had turned down and went in between the fish's gills and body. A family member had grabbed my long nosed pliers from my backpack so I didn't have the pliers with me and it took me a good probably 5 minutes to get the hook out. I kept the fish in the water but it probably died from loosing a lot of blood, it was bleeding a lot or me stressing it out trying to dislodge the hook. Anyways it died. I never had that happen before and as silly as it sounds it made me actually leave the lake because I felt so bad. I know that sounds dumb because fishing is literally stabbing a fish in the mouth and taking it out the water lol. My question is, is there anything I could have done to make the hook not point down? Or is this just part of fishing and it's going to happen at times? Never had this happen with the other rigs. Even the first couple of bass i caught on the texas rig got hooked correctly. I also don't feel I took too long to set the hook because I moved the rod up as soon as a felt something hit it. I am still learning though. Thanks

I was able to get out today and use my stuff for the first time. I stayed for about 5 hours and got two obvious bites. The first was a largemouth it was about 9ft away from me and managed to shake loose and the second bite I was to slow on the reaction and missed. This was on the 4 1/2 morning dawn roboworm and 3/16oz drop shot rig. I didn't get any reaction with the senkos today. Even though I didn't catch anything it was a lot of fun. Now the line.... it was slapping a few times against the rod and first line loop. My casts varied from 18 to 25ish yards. I wasn't using an real strength to cast mainly my wrist. If I didn't close the bail as soon as I hit the water some line would come off and sometimes tangle around the reel.

Yes, I would prefer to just use one type of line because the various knots and all seem kinda difficult to me since I'm just starting. I'd likely go to 8lb fluoro or mono before I made a complete switch to braid and leaders. I just came in with the mindset of heavy line means good.

Thanks guys for the help. I'm glad y'all seem to think I'll be alright at least for a while. I just wanted to make sure the line or equipment matched okay enough to at least begin. Should the line give me problems I'll switch it out to braid and leaders. I'll definitely order some of the conditioner and spray it on. Thanks for the advice again guys. Helps a ton.

I have a St. Croix Triumph 6'6" medium power fast action rod. It is 2 pieces. Model # TRS66MF2. Lure 1/4 - 5/8oz. The reel is a Shimano Nasci C3000HG. I don't know much of anything about fishing and went ahead and spooled it with 12lb seaguar fluorocarbon invizx. I'm not sure if that was a horrible idea but from what I read online it seems to be. So should I remove this line and get some type of braid and use the 12lb fluorocarbon as a leader or start over with 10-20lb braid and 8lb fluoro? I plan on sticking to texas & wacky rigged 5 inch senkos and 3/16oz drop shot rigs with 4 1/2 inch robo worms for a while until i become more expierenced. I'm honestly not even sure if my rod and reel are appropriate for that task. This is just what I bought. There was just so much options at the store and online I got kinda overwhelmed with it all. I'm in Arizona and I wanted to fish for Largemouth. Any advice is appreciated thanks.