I fish the Rapala XRap 8 almost every time I am on the lake. It catches me every lunker I have caught this season. My problem is I only catch and release and the treble hooks on the xrap seems to damage the fish to much to release them. The hooks don't seem that bad until I land the fish and they start flopping and thrashing around in my hand. I have never seen bass so feisty like the ones that are in this farm pond I am fishing. I have tried replacing the trebles with single hooks and that didn't work I lost a lot of fish. My couple questions are I am thinking about taking one treble hook off and just using one on the lure. Which one should I keep on? Also what can I do to control these fish once I get them. I fish from shore so when they are about 6 inches to 1 foot from shore i pick the line up to lift the fish out of the water to lip it so it doesn't touch the dry ground?

If it were me I would buy a pair of waders and move into the water a short distance and use a net and since these fish are in a farm pond they tend to be more aggressive if there are a large number of fish to fight for meals.

If you feel you have to lower the number of hooks on your bait I would most likely remove just the front hook set and leave the rear But it may not be you who is doing the damage alone, other people may be using the same type of bait and helping the process of damaging the mouth's of these fish.

I fish the Rapala XRap 8 almost every time I am on the lake. It catches me every lunker I have caught this season. My problem is I only catch and release and the treble hooks on the xrap seems to damage the fish to much to release them. The hooks don't seem that bad until I land the fish and they start flopping and thrashing around in my hand. I have never seen bass so feisty like the ones that are in this farm pond I am fishing. I have tried replacing the trebles with single hooks and that didn't work I lost a lot of fish. My couple questions are I am thinking about taking one treble hook off and just using one on the lure. Which one should I keep on? Also what can I do to control these fish once I get them. I fish from shore so when they are about 6 inches to 1 foot from shore i pick the line up to lift the fish out of the water to lip it so it doesn't touch the dry ground?

Please explain in more detail.........

Well What I mean when I say the treble hooks are damaging the fish are that when I get the fish out of the water about 90% of the time it is bleeding badly from the mouth (usually the small bass this happens to) and the second hook is hooked into its gill. Then I get one hook out (usually I go for the hook in the gill first) and it flops around in my hand and re hooks the hook back into its gill almost every time making it bleed from the gill as well.

Mash the hook barbs down, the lack of a barb on the hook will minimize the damage and make unhooking them easier.

Mash the hook barbs down, the lack of a barb on the hook will minimize the damage and make unhooking them easier.

Now that we have the rest of the story I have to agree

this does wonders for getting fish off.

I was doing some research on the internet and I was wondering if anybody has heard of putting a wet rag over the bass' eyes when pulling it out of the water to subdue it?  The website I was on said the if the fish can't see it will not be aggressive and let you do whatever you want.

how are you holding the bass when you remove the hooks?

I lip them. I put my thumb in their mouth and place my fingers under their bottom jaw.

when I catch pike I hold them upside down it keeps them from thrashing around (unless they are too big, not usually a problem for me ) I imagine it would work for bass too.

Mashing down the barbs is definitely an option. When you said that you missed more with single hooks, what type were you using?  If you can, you might want to look for Siwash hooks.  These are the type that I use to replace trebles on my inline spinners and spoons when regulations prohibit the use of trebles.

I too am a shore bound angler and from my experience I have learned for the bigger fish, playing them longer to tire them out definitely makes it easier to lip them when they're close enough, treble or not.  I refrain from pulling them in from the line whenever possible, because that can be a recipe for a breakoff and a lost lure.

So in short, if I were in that situation, I would mash the barbs. It will definitely help with hook removal. And I would play the fish a little longer to tire it a little more.

Shore fishing here also. I have landed 7lb+ bass, as was said, go barbless, and tire the fish out a bit before trying to land them. There's no reason why a fish should ever touch the ground, even if your taking pic's..

Another thing you can do for the smaller bass is Gently grab them on their gills, this kind of settles them down to where they won't squirm around, once they settle down, you can then lip them.

One thing I like to do is IF the fish had a tough fight..i.e. it took awhile to tire them out, while having them lipped, move them forward in water to oxygenate them for about 15 secs. or so, this seems to help them, though I don't have any documented proof..

Generally grabbing a bass by the lower jaw immobilizes them.

Do you use needle node pliers to remove the hooks?

Bass will freeze when held upside down, belly up. Grasp the bass with one hand over the back of the head, thumb firmly on one gill cover and two fingers on the opposite side on the other gill cover. The bass mouth will open and the fish will be motionless long enough to unhook. Large bass can be held with the fingers inside the mouth, the thumb on the outside lip ridge, lift with the belly upright, instead of the traditional thumb in the inside front of the mouth and jaw bent backwards. Bending the jaw back causes a lot of mouth/jaw injuries.

Bending the hook barb down with a needle pliers helps. Try different lures like a weedless frog or soft plastic worm and your treble hook issues are eliminated.

WRB