A Simple Way To Avoid Getting Hung Up

By Tim Barefoot

Whatever you fish for, be it fresh or saltwater, you know where you should be fishing. But sometimes it can be frightening to cast into
the heart of a snag or brushpile where the fish are, knowing you might lose whatever you have tied on.

Here’s a simple way to avoid getting hung up. With the following snag-resistant rig, you can present a bait to the fish where they live in- stead of trying to lure them out of their hiding place. I’m not saying this tackle is immune to mazes of mangrove roots or treetops, but it greatly reduces the chances of getting hung up. Protect the hook point with a fluorocarbon weed guard, and you can fish more effectively in thick cover.

This method works with J hooks, circle hooks and some lures. I’ve been using this technique to make a weedless soft-plastic shrimp, and there are countless other applications. One of my favorite and most ef- fective ways to use this is with a single hook, no weight and a live bait in shallow water. It also works well on a circle hook chin weight under a sliding cork over really rough bottom. Sometimes you have to go in the cover or drift just above it, to get the bite. Most gamefish attack from below, so a bait on a sliding cork is the ultimate target while staying out of snags.

Here are the steps to snelling a weed guard onto the shank of the hook. I like the stiffness of Seagar 80-pound fluoro for weed guards. Depending on your application, other lines might work fine also. Make sure to choose a hook with an eye that will accept two pieces of the weed guard and the leader you are snelling.

1. Cut about 6 inches of 80-pound fluoro and bend it backward against the curve of the spool. This will mold the shape of your weed guard.
2. Insert both tag ends through the backside of the hook eye, leav- ing an inch of the doubled 80-pound fluoro on the shank of the hook.
3. Pass a leader line down through the eye of the hook and the cen- ter of the tag ends of
   the 80-pound fluoro. Pull out about 6 or 8inches.
4. Holding the weed guard securely on the hook shank, make a 5- or 6-loop snell over the 80-pound fluoro, going forward toward the eye of the hook. DO NOT pull down hard on it right away.
5. Keeping the 80-pound fluoro straight on the hook shank, gently roll into place and push for- ward BEFORE pulling down hard to “cinch” the snell.
6. After everything is pulled up tight, trim the 80-pound fluoro off just behind the barb of the hook. Also, trim the doubled 80-pound
   fluoro close behind the snell.

Check out the videos below for more info. And my website https://barefootcatsandtackle.com/