It seems like I've used a bunch of unhooking tools with various degrees of satisfaction. Usually, it seems I go with the Leatherman Wave pliers that are always on me.

When doing more than drive by fishing, I usually take a longer pair of fishing pliers.

When going fly fishing, I usually take one of these.
http://www.orvis.com/store/product.aspx?pf_id=230Y

For quite a while now, I've been thinking about trying one of these.
http://www.unhookum.com/

It just appears that it would work better than anything else I've tried. Have any of you tried it or know of something better?

I've used a set of small curved hemostats for the past few years and I'm happy. $1.00 each at the local flea markets. Stem to stern they are about 6" long.

Good point. I forgot about those. I've had several of those too over the years. They undoubtedly work.

If i want to remove hooks easily from fish I just crimp the barb down. Very rarely will I need a pair of needle nose pliers. I'm not crazy about the hemostats.

I once had to deliver a pair of hemostats to a friend that left them at my pond. I was worried if I was pulled over, and the cop saw them on the car seat, he would assume it was a roach clip!

Ahh, you worry too much. All you had to do is have him smell the end and he'd know the difference for sure!

Like Cecil, I find that a crimped barb is the best solution when I'm concerned about catch and release.

Over more than 50 years, I've spent a lot of money on supposed hook removal tools, from oddball looking red and white plastic things that look like they have perforated footballs on each end, to forceps that look like hi-tech rubber band guns.

Hemostats sure are hard on the fingers, but at least if they are made of high quality stainless steel, they will open and close without too much finger pain. I do have several sets in various tackle boxes.

No matter what kind of lubricant is used, and what brand is purchased, long nose pliers always seem to become extremely difficult to open and close if they regularly are used for fishing.

Sometimes, just nothing seems to work -- like when all you see is the eye of a long shank hook at the entrance to the gullet, a hook that has ripped a gill that is gushing blood, or the end of the hook is poking out of an eyeball. This is when I'm really glad I have my own private water.

I've seen way too many dead fish with hooks impaled in gullets or gills to know that cutting the line and leaving the hook will allow a fish to recover.

When I regularly fished public waters it really bothered me when I legally had to release a fish that I knew would never live, no matter what I did.

Geeze, as I re-read this, my post sure seems grim. But, then I think about my walk around the perimeter of my pond this afternoon with an ultralight rig. I was casting a rubber worm hooked with a crimped barb #1 long-shank gold hook. The fish, particularly the bass, were just going crazy. Nearly every cast resulted in a bass or bluegill. Not a single one was dangerously hooked. I also believe that part of this is due to a feel -- gently pulling a line to set the hook as soon as the slightest hit is sensed.

Good Fishn'
Ken

This tool is by far the best thing for when a fish has a hook in it's gullet:



I always tamp down the barbs at my pond.

This tool is like $.99, real inexpensive.

Not to raise too fine a point but better than a hemostat but similar is a needle driver. This is a surgical instrument we use to sew and is designed to grasp needles whereas hemostats are designed to clamp soft tissue. The difference is in the length of the jaw compared to the handle and the ruggedness of the the jaw. The needle driver jaw is much, much shorter than the handle section whereas the hemostat is relatively longer and often curved. The secret to not having these instruments not hurt your fingers is just using the tips of your fingers to handle them. I find using a hemostat or needle driver to remove gut hooked fish is most effective when the instrument is gently inserted throught the gills because it approaches the hook perpendicularly allowing the rotation of the hook in the usual manner for removal. I insert throught gills but observe through the mouth what I am doing. I have even successfully crimped the barb on a hook in situ in the gullet using this exposure. I concur that barbless fishing is the way to go if you are releasing fish.

Arthroscopic Fish Hook Removal
the next in a series of home-remedy surgical procedures by Doc Runkle
Order before midnight and receive free, as a bonus, the doctor's handy field guide: Mature Bluegill Removal from the Human Esophagus.

Can you explain the procedure to use that thing? I've seen them for sale but never knew how they work.

If you put 4 of them in a candy bar machine, you can get a Baby Ruth bar. I don't know about the red thing.

Is there any possibility that Doc Runkle would humor us by giving a synopsis of how this fine field guide came about?

OK, Bullhead.

The two ends are the same purpose, just different sizes.

In each "ball" on the ends, there is a slot that goes through, axially (sp?), to the center of the ball.

When the fish is gullet hooked, you keep tension on the line. In the fishes mouth, but not as far as the gullet, you thread the fishing line into the center of the ball. Then, keeping tension on the line, you push the ball down into the fishes gullet. Now, the shape of the downward side of the ball fills the hook-gape (the eye of the hook goes up inside the ball a little bit) and then you pull the plunger all they way back out of the gullet/mouth. The hook point is flush against the ball so it does not catch on any soft tissue. Back when you pushed the ball through the gullet, the tension on the line forced the hook shank into the center shaft of the ball; then w/ the tension on the line against the force of the plunger going into the gullet, the hook is freed.

If you live bait fish, this thing is a must. It is so cheap also. Whenever I see some at a tackle store, I buy them all.

See Lake Thunderbird Stories, published 2007 by The University of Oklahoma Press.

I just read Layton's post to Ricki.

Here's how the conversation went:

JHAP: Ricki, listen to this post that Layton Runkle made. (and I read the post). We need to get some needle drivers.

JWHAP: I have needle drivers in the Ranch medical kit.

JHAP: EXCELLENT! We need to put them in the tackle box.

JWHAP: You are not using my seventy dollar german made needle drivers to remove hooks from your fish.

JHAP: MY fish, they are our fish. Besides, it's doctor's orders.

JWHAP: You get your own dam needle drivers, mine are staying in the first aid kit. I haven't forgotten the turkey baster incident you know.

JHAP: Ok, ok, but you have to admit the turkey baster worked quite nicely to remove the oil that I spilled on the intake manifold.

So now I gotta get me my own needle driver. Dang wives can be so unreasonable.

Women don't just understand a man's priorities.

I'm seeing a giant turkey baster, about a mile long, being floated out into the Gulf off the coast of Louisiana...

LOL, Brettski.

Hey, that was too funny not to get a response!!