Am I the only one that lip-hooks both my suckers and bullies?
I use a hook sharpener and keep my hooks hypodermic-sharp… so hooking a bullie thru the face is no biggie. I find they have better action and stay alive longer, especially if there’s any kind of current.
How do you hook up your baits?
Do you think it even makes any difference?
I have tried both and won’t go back to lip hooking. I think the bullheads struggle more, making noise, than when they are lip hooked. Lip hooked, they really don’t have to move because they are facing the current. Tail hooked, they have to struggle more to face the current.
This is a hooking subject that can go eigther way but its important to me. I’ve hooked them through the back just behind and under the dorsal fin until a guy showed me another way. I use bluegills because bullheads are hard to find and hook them through the front of the eye socket. I pull the eyes back as much as I can and put the point just behind the nose bone and through both eye sockets. When fishing catfish I use a smaller hook, a 1 ot. being the biggest, even flatheads and set my drag accordingly.
When I used to run trotlines alot I used even a smaller hook, mostly useing no 2’s and the bluegills stayed alive longer then back hooking them. I found that hooking them through the back they often die because of blood loss and hooking them through the eye socket theres very little. I’ve had hooks baited for up to 2 days and the bluegills would still be alive, hooking them through the back and they would die. I know current has alot to do with it and when hooking through the eye socket they are usually faceing the current. When a fish takes the gill the hooks barb is exposed and I get good hook ups. I also get decent hookups when hooking through the back but usually there isn’t as much barb exposed. Beings a fish swollows the gill head first the barbs in a good postition for a good hook up. It works for me and others down this way but theres alot of guys here that hook through the back too.
Trying to be a little conservation minded here, which doesn’t count if you’re planning a flathead dinner the next day…
I opt for the tail hooking of a bully for the reason Pug described and keeping in mind as Mossy mentioned, the bait goes down the gullet head first. This would mean a higher chance of a gut hooked fish.
There will be some that will argue this…but that’s ok, I’m erring on the side of caution because both ways will catch fish. 
Tail hooked.
Gut hooked. 
That is a good point about gut hooking when baiting through the nose of the bullhead.
Larry likes to hook through the lips. I wonder if he uses J or circle hooks? I wouldn’t think circles would be affective if the flathead is allowed some time with the bait and it goes down head first.
I wonder if there are enough people here that we could correlate types of hooks and where they are hooked. For example it would be interesting if people who hook through the lips and started using circles switched to J styles after a lot of misses. Or maybe continued to use circles, but switched to hooking the bullhead through the back and experienced a better hook up ratio.
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Larry likes to hook through the lips. I wonder if he uses J or circle hooks? I wouldn’t think circles would be affective if the flathead is allowed some time with the bait and it goes down head first.
I tend to use big circle hooks and liphook both suckers and bullheads. So far this year I’m actually running a 100% success rate in the “runs vs hookups” department… knock on wood. And, so far, everything from a 5# flat that took a 10″ sucker to a 43″ 40# flat that took a 6″ bullhead, has been a nice, tidy, corner-of-the-mouth hooking.
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I have tried both and won’t go back to lip hooking. I think the bullheads struggle more, making noise, than when they are lip hooked. Lip hooked, they really don’t have to move because they are facing the current. Tail hooked, they have to struggle more to face the current.
Next time you’re fishing in a current, lip-hook a piece of bait and hold it just under the surface of the water… watch the action you get. It’s a very consistent, very active sine wave. It’s the natural action of a fish pointing into the current. It’s the action fish use to hold position in the current naturally.
Now, find a shallow spot where there’s some current but you can still see the bottom. Take your tail-hooked bullhead and lay it down so you can see it and the weight. Chances are the bullhead will be moving less because it’s effectively pinned in place by the water pressure… and trust me, it doesn’t take much across the bullie’s whole body to pin it down.
Lip-hooking a fish will make it fight, because it over-balances the fish to the front and it’ll headshake (ummm… just like any fish you catch on hook and line, they fight it!) They buck and wobble and tug. A back-hooked fish has a hole in it’s back, but little reason to struggle… it’s more like having a pierced ear.
I failed to mention that I use rattles with lip-hooked bait… and I have yet to go home skunked using them, period.
We really need to do some side-by-side comparisons…
That would be tough Mike. Everyone uses the hook (equipment) they believe in. Otherwise they wouldn’t be using it. 
I’m less than 25% missed runs for the year using Octopus J’s tail hooking the bullies.
Knock on a walleye. 
PS
Here’s the rattle floats I’ve been using from Everts.
I’ve only tried the glow color.
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Next time you’re fishing in a current, lip-hook a piece of bait and hold it just under the surface of the water… watch the action you get. It’s a very consistent, very active sine wave. It’s the natural action of a fish pointing into the current. It’s the action fish use to hold position in the current naturally.
You telling me a bullhead hooked in the back won’t do the same? It has little resistance because the sinker is not constricting it’s movements. And one hooked in the back needs to struggle to get its nose facing the current. I’ve observed both plenty of times.
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Now, find a shallow spot where there’s some current but you can still see the bottom. Take your tail-hooked bullhead and lay it down so you can see it and the weight. Chances are the bullhead will be moving less because it’s effectively pinned in place by the water pressure… and trust me, it doesn’t take much across the bullie’s whole body to pin it down.
A lip hooked bullhead will be pinned too. Let your bullhead soak their for longer than 5 minutes and I see if the lip hooked one has given up and is just resting on the bottom. A tail hooked bullhead has to struggle constantly to try and right itself.
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Lip-hooking a fish will make it fight, because it over-balances the fish to the front and it’ll headshake (ummm… just like any fish you catch on hook and line, they fight it!) They buck and wobble and tug. A back-hooked fish has a hole in it’s back, but little reason to struggle… it’s more like having a pierced ear.
So you telling me you have never foul hooked a fish? Which fights harder? You have leverage on a lip hooked fish and it can dampen the struggle.
But like Brian says, you go with what you feel comfortable with when hooking a bullhead. Confidence is the most important thing.
Keep in mind I only shore fish for Flatheads and have done so for about the last 10 years or so. I’ve always hooked bullheads/suckers/chubs through the lips. I’ve never had a problem when hooking them that way (I can’t remember ever gut hooking a Flathead). I have caught lots of big fish over the years this way and concluded long ago that it works for me.
I say go with whatever you are most comfortable with and gives you the most confidence. There isn’t really a right or wrong answer here.
Lip hook in super fast current, otherwise they die, everything else tail.
I wondering how a pinned bullhead in current makes my rod tip dance all night…..
Ya BrianK, while running trotlines almost every to every channel and some flatheads were hooked around the lip area, none were hooked so deep I had to use a hook remover of some sort. With all the fish we caught and that was many, I didn’t even have a pair of needle noses or a fish knocker in the boat. A fish knocker is something a few guys use down this way. You just slide the hook down the line next to the fishhook, lift the knocker and pull down on the line along side the fishes body and jerk the knocker real quick and the hook comes right out. Their the best hook remover I’ve ever seen or used, bar none. Hey maybe I should make a few and sell them, alot of guys would agree their the best removers around.
When I approached my lines it was best to be as quiet as possible because some of the fish that were hooked in the mouth were about ready to get free because of the hook tearing the mouth area, approaching the line quietly and the fish were less apt to try to get free. I seldom if any got a fish that was hooked in the gullet. 99.9% of them were mouth or lip hooked, its a safe way to return them to the water.
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I wondering how a pinned bullhead in current makes my rod tip dance all night…..
Bats!
Where would a guy hook a bat as bait?
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Larry likes to hook through the lips. I wonder if he uses J or circle hooks? I wouldn’t think circles would be affective if the flathead is allowed some time with the bait and it goes down head first.
Are you talking about this Larry? I can’t recall the last time I lip hooked anything if you are. Marc Audemp might be who your thinking of… I can’t recall which way he does.
Not to say it doesn’t work, I’ve seen guys that do lip hook, but not very many.
I use J hooks with live bait, unless I have a bobber, then its circle hooks, also use them with cut bait.
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Are you talking about this Larry? I can’t recall the last time I lip hooked anything if you are. Marc Audemp might be who your thinking of… I can’t recall which way he does.
Not to say it doesn’t work, I’ve seen guys that do lip hook, but not very many.I use J hooks with live bait, unless I have a bobber, then its circle hooks, also use them with cut bait.
There is no other Larry in my book.
I could have sworn it was you. You have never lip hooked? My memory must be worse than I thought. I guess it was someone else. Sorry for implicating you.
Oh wait. I think I lip hook bullheads.
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PS
Here’s the rattle floats I’ve been using from Everts.
I’ve only tried the glow color.
What you do in your bedroom is your own business. shhhh.
Brian Wa Beads!
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PS
Here’s the rattle floats I’ve been using from Everts.
I’ve only tried the glow color.
What you do in your bedroom is your own business. shhhh.
LMAO OMG… a new product… BK’s Rattling Catfish 
Beads, good for you, good for them, good for the environment!
BUSTED! 
WOW!!
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WOW!!
Whatcha mean Sauger? You told me about them!
The question is, did he show you how they work.
Sorry, I guess I needed a cheap laugh. Fishing for me has been slow this last week and a half. One river’s in the trees, the other is just bank full and I haven’t found any fish.
I’ve been fishin, playin a nintendo my wife bought me for Christmas. I’ve been eyeballing a tiny tv to watch football on the water. Fishin partners are scarce but I guess that is nothing new.
Forecast for this week: 50% chance of depression with scattered bits of optimism.
They’re letting a lot of water out of the dam where the flathead rescue thing went on a year or two ago. Maybe it will bring a few fish up. Even though it’s close to the spawn, it doesn’t seem like the females stop travelling? It’s one of those deals, I know fish are there somewhere and it might be a quarter of a mile away from where I’m wasting my time.
I lip hook bullheads when I use them and tail/back hook bluegills.
Lip-hooked bullheads live forever, can be used in any current, and can catch three or four cats. They do NOT stop struggling.
I used to use 4/0 kahles and back then I would also lip-hook bigger bluegills, which worked very well also.
With 7/0 kahles I can hook even bigger bluegills behind the dorsal fin with no trouble.
The “trouble” of which I speak, of course, is not having enough exposed hook, which is also the reason I prefer lip-hooking bullheads. I have a terrific hookup ratio with lip-hooked bait of any kind, and have not noticed any increase in gut-hooked cats. Gut-hooking is the result of a fish having the bait long enough to swallow it before the hit is detected and acted upon. A hook in the tail or a hook in the lips will both be in the gut when that happens.
With a lip-hooked fish you basically hammer the flathead as soon as you are aware that it’s holding your bait. There is no need to wait for it to start moving with the bait. If it has any part of your bait in its mouth, it’s pretty likely that the hook is in there.
Josh it sounds like you’ve had a streak of bad luck. If you’ve got the itch to catch just about anything and a boat try running a trotline from shore out to a tree. Preferably by the entry from the river to the back water if there is one and bait with 3″ and over bluegills. With the timber flooded right now the channels are hitting like crazy around here. My old buddy came over today and he said he did real well last week when he set his poles on channels. Young Paul cleaned his fish in his cage so I won’t have to now, but hes been killing the channels lately and on minnows because he can’t get any bluegills. He hasen’t been getting any big channels because hes useing minnows, if he were using bluegills the smaller ones couldn’t take them. A bigger catfish will take a bait of any size, big or small, the smaller catfish can’t take a big bluegill of 3″ and over. Im talking just pounders up to 3 pounds, thats all hes been catching, perfect panfryers but no size to them. With the river like it is right now I know its a 50lb. day with things like they are. If I could just find the time right now I’d go, maybe tomorrow afternoon.
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PS
Here’s the rattle floats I’ve been using from Everts.
I’ve only tried the glow color.
What you do in your bedroom is your own business. shhhh.
LMAO OMG… a new product… BK’s Rattling Catfish
Sorry to say … but I watched him use them one night…I was impressed with the results
You guys are all just sick! 
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