04-03-2008, 03:35 AM
a barbless hook is used so you can remove the hook from the fish cleaner.. making it less traumatic for the fish and thus increasing its chance of survival.. in my experience you can still catch fish to keep with a barbless hook..
.. if I am not mistaken you can buy hooks and maybe flies that are already barbless.. but if not you can make it barbless very easily.. you can use small needle nose pliars.. or a hemostat to gently "crush" the barb back down into the hook.. one tool I bought for tying flies is called a barb crusher.. it has a special head on it to crush the barb down yet reduce the chance of damge to the hook or breaking it all together.. that is why I said gently crush.. you dont have to strong arm it to flatten the barb...
..hope this helps..
MacFly![[Image: fish-on.gif]](http://www.bigfishtackle.com/images/gforum/fish-on.gif)
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.. if I am not mistaken you can buy hooks and maybe flies that are already barbless.. but if not you can make it barbless very easily.. you can use small needle nose pliars.. or a hemostat to gently "crush" the barb back down into the hook.. one tool I bought for tying flies is called a barb crusher.. it has a special head on it to crush the barb down yet reduce the chance of damge to the hook or breaking it all together.. that is why I said gently crush.. you dont have to strong arm it to flatten the barb...
..hope this helps..
MacFly
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