AP good suggestion. Wivell, I have had some similar problems, so I always fish with jigs now - usually 1/16 or 1/32 tipped with plastic or a nub O crawler. Never had one gut hooked since.
If you are live bait fishing I really love True Turn sz 8 wire minnow hooks...never gut hooked with a true turn - the baitholders you are using are notorious for gut hooking - the true turns pop right into their mouths when setting the hook every time. If you also pinch the barbs I imagine it would be foolproof.
How are your YP growing? I stocked 4-6" last sept myself and am up to around 8-9". How are you fishing for them?
Tee - True Turn sounds good, We'll give those a try.
We stocked in early Nov. I haven't measured anything lately but I'd say they average 7-8" right now. We have been feeding some pellets but I think the only thing eating them is the dozen CC in the pond. There's a few RES on spawning beds and they will try the pellets but spit them out. We haven't seen any YP or SMB eating pellets.
Still seem to have a decent amount of FHM in the pond. We put 10 lb in 4 months ahead of the other fish stocking and they spawned a number of times. Walking the shoreline we can see lots of FHM in all sizes.
