hooks for trout

I've been doing more c&r pellethead fishing the last couple years. But still end up taking some home for dinner due to deep hooking. Anybody have any suggestions to lessen gut hooks while bait fishing? A friend of mine suggested the smallest size walleye wide gap hooks, and they seem to reduce but not eliminate deep hooks. I've tried a few different sizes of octopus circles but they swallow those sometimes too. Larger profile/firmer baits like pb worms or pb salmon eggs also seem to help, but not eliminate. Anybody hookin them all in the mouth w bait?

size 10,12 and 14 hooks

Matzuo circles work pretty good? I tie all my own leaders, but will try some of their hooks. psu, 10,12,14 salmon egg hooks go right down the throat, that's what I'm trying to prevent. I'd rather miss a few fish than gut hook 1. I'm talking about fishing baits floated off the bottom from either a small slip sinker, or a split shot in lakes. I've caught plenty that already have leader material hanging out their mouths, I would just like to lessen this and spread the word out there to other people. I fished w a duud the other day using eagle claw baitholder leaders, every time he hooked one, he said, well its probably gut hooked... Sure enough, it was, he would just undo his snap swivel and toss it back. He gut hooked every fish he caught, I only gut hooked 2 out of 7 and kept the 2.

Live bait in general is tough to stop fish from swallowing, I just use cheap hooks and cut them off, or small salmon egg hooks, never had a problem with a swallowed salmon egg hook

http://gamakatsu.com/catalog/walleye.htm the smallest size of these have worked the best for me, a little on the large size but that probably helps too. About the only hook I've never had one swallow is a jighead, but that has to be fished under a float and can be a real pain on a windy day. I like to throw one bait rod out on the bottom(or 2 now) and cast lures w the other, so a quickly moving float just makes things difficult. Maybe ill pick up some small floating jigheads, I just don't like the hooks I've seen on any that I have used.

Blackbird Sabers in a #14, normally fish with a tiny clear float and maggots or waxworms on long rods. Very rarely deep hooked a trout as long as you lift on any sign of a strike/bump/tap

Still water, bottom fishing w/ floating baits (power bait and the like) is the only time I'm having real issues. I love those blackbird hooks. I use em for steelhead all the time in sz 12&14.

Try a 6 or a 4. A little harder to swallow and a bigger shank to grab with your forceps. Don't know why fisherman use such small hooks, maybe they feel a better fisherman to say I landed them on 2# test and a #20 hook. They are not hard to fool...WF

dont wait for the hook set. if your float is moving the fish has your bait. so many people seem to thing they got to wait till their float goes under. by that time the fish has it swallowed. when your float moves, rip em.

6 or 4 lol

Hooks are not your problem, your weight or too much slack (Bulldog mentioned this 1st)in the line (usually caused by too much weight). If you cant feel the fish bite and dont set the hook quickly, you're going to gut hook them. But I've caught plenty of trout that had hooks in the bellies, they survive pretty well till the rust out.
Hooks, anything sharp and in the 10-14 size range works well for me.

For stream fishing crawlers I use a size 8 or 10 baitholder, usually the black chrome Matzuo. Put a small corkie above the hook and a split shot or two 12" up. The corkie floats the bait just off the bottom and keeps the bait moving. The fish hit the bait harder and make it easier to detect the bite, giving them less time to swallow the hook. I had zero gut hooks last year with this set up.

When you use to much weight the bait gets hung up and gives the fish time to swallow, especially bottom hugging brownies. Lighter line and a more sensitive rod will help detect more bites as well, reducing gut hooks.

Throw all this out the window for stillwater trout. Try bending the barb down for starters. Use powerbait, crawlers and minnows only if you want to keep stillwater fish. Try tiny rapalas, spoons and spinners for catch and release.

-Jay

Try tying some small corn hair rigs and embed the loop in the pb.

cool idea!