Experienced anglers understand it's the smallest details that make a big difference in hooking fish sometimes. It's stubborn tradition, says Bob Williamson, a state fisheries biologist and hook-setting revisionist who tells us fishermen for years have been going out of their way to do it all wrong. For anglers who use live bait regularly, such advice is sacrilege. The trouble, he explains, is that covering the business part of the hook means fish won't get hooked sometimes. I always leave the tip exposed now.
Every fisherman thinks the opposite.
Most of us were taught the theory that fish can detect the hook after chewing a bit and spit out the bait. But that's not how it works, Williamson says. While fish have the ability to spit out a bait once they've sucked it in, they're more likely to get hooked if the hook is exposed. Relating such a simple discovery has been a hard sell among tradition-strong anglers, Williamson says. He descibes instances of literally catching hundreds of fish while others watched and failed.