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Bluegill Food & Heavy Hook

This is what I call a bluegill beast hook. Note this line is also a little heavy for my liking. This is the heaviest hook I fish when the gills are slam'n. This is 2 sizes larger than my Spring hook selection. Next to that hook would be common bluegill food - a bloodworm (midgefly larvae).
If you can image in it, I fished bloodworm in a World Championships on a size 22 hook. Single bloodworm, tiny hook. Fish something that fits in their mouth and they will eat it.

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Albums: Ultralight Fishing

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Comment by Johnny wilkins on March 26, 2014 at 6:08pm: Chironomids = Bloodworms YES!! YES!

Guess what, competitive ice fishermen on our USA team use these as their primary bait and attractant . Allen is right, you will find them in every single body of water where there is life. The picture of the bloodworm in my hand (chironomid) was from my backyard garden pond. They are very midge-y. And, yes, they will catch you bluegills because it is one of their many meal foods.

Comment by Leo Nguyen on March 26, 2014 at 5:59pm: Allen, I see them in stagnant ponds and septic overflow pools, which I don't like to handle. I don't see them in the shallow areas of the lakes around here, where fishes are the apex predators of the water. I'll be interesting to raise them in the warmer months for fishing purposes..but wife will not like the flies coming from theses midges.

Comment by David, aka, "McScruff" on March 26, 2014 at 5:58pm: I can't imagine such small hooks and trying to get a bloodworm on one
I find that size 16 is about as small as I care to go.

Comment by Allen Morgan on March 26, 2014 at 5:49pm: This is why most Chironomid flies are done with red vinyl tubing.

Leo, have you tried any Chironomids out there? I'm sure you have midges. They're everywhere......

Comment by Joe Angelucci on March 26, 2014 at 5:30pm: Micro noodle by Little Atom. Amazing bluegill soft plastic bait. I used 1.5 mm for micro fishing. You get 18 .875 inch noodles for about $1.00.

Comment by Johnny wilkins on March 26, 2014 at 4:34pm: Yes- it should be common here as well - soon. The hook pictured is a "power hook" - very thick.

Colonial style are still used today - just not here where people wouldn't take the time to snell their own.

I do snell my own hooks just like the colonials would have had to by hand (or by merchant/slave hand).

You are all correct however these are the hooks sold in Japan in the mainstream. The steel loop adds a bunch of weight to the hook and makes it move differently in the water- thus we are the only ones in the world who fell in love with threading line through a tiny eye loop (which by the way is brutal on smaller hooks - right?!).

So what happens, we fish bigger and bigger to get a nice big fat loop to put the line through? The solution is the reverse-innovation that has shaped our fishing since the early 1900's...

True small size #22 hooks are really small with the spade end (vs. the same hook with a loop).

Great posts guys!

Comment by JBplusThuy on March 26, 2014 at 2:49pm: John, that style of hook is still really common in Japan. You can buy snelled hooks like that in any bait shop, ranging in size from tiny (but maybe not size 22 tiny) to saltwater.

Comment by John Sheehan on March 26, 2014 at 12:50pm: I am not so sure Leo! The old style hooks (Colonial style ) didn't use eyes on their hooks ,they snelled straight to a shaft that had no eye . Waiting for Johnny's reply to see if he is going ultra Retro here. Bad pics but here are some I saw at a booth at an Expo: http://bigbluegill.com/photo/p1280707?context=album&albumId=203...

Comment by Leo Nguyen on March 26, 2014 at 12:39pm: John, I think there might be an eyelet there. Even a #24 hook as an eyelet, but extremely small. Using braid less than 6# test or 2# test mono is the only way to go.