Choosing the right length of hooklength can be confusing sometimes, but it’s absolutely vital for getting you more bites. On so many occasions, I’ve made a change and gone from tearing my hair out to catching one a chuck.
Many ready-tied hooks come on a long length of line and it’s easy to think that’s what you should be using. In actual fact, a fraction of that is required. It’s not too hard to begin fishing with the right hooklength – what’s more important is how and when you make changes to catch more.
For example, when bream fishing with a feeder, shortening the hooklength can catch quicker and turn iffy bites into proper ones. On the pole, it’s all down to the depth of water and how close you can get the final shot on the rig to the hook.
For example, I carry boxes full of spools of different lengths for feeder and bomb work, but that’s not practical for everyone. My advice here would be to tie your feeder hooklengths 1m long because you’ll then have the option to shorten them if need be. This also means less time spent in the tackle room tying hooklengths beforehand!
Two for the pole
For pole fishing, my standard length for fishing in deep water is 6ins, whereas in shallow swims in the margins, that’s cut to 4ins.
Feeder means short
For Hybrid or Method fishing, use just 4ins. I might shorten this to 2ins-3ins if I was fishing for F1s and the fishery rules allowed.
Go long on a bomb
I’d begin with 18ins then shorten it to where I’m getting bites as the bait settles. If there are lots of liners, I’d drop to 12ins.
Make a change
Altering lengths is a sure-fire way to catch more bream on the feeder. I’ll start at 50cm, going to 1m on hard days or 25cm to beat liners.
