5 gear secrets from a pro fishing guide to keep you catching all day

#1  TERMINAL TACKLE

All anglers have a box full of hooks, weights, snaps and swivels, but pros keep a much wider selection, and change them up more frequently. They also often use their terminal tackle in more creative ways, and keep it in transparent boxes to make it easier to find what they need.

HOOKS

Think beyond basic snelled hooks and jig heads. Instead, keep an array of extra-wide gaps for bulkier plastics, fine-wire finesse hooks for drop-shotting, and a stash of circle or octopus hooks if you’re drifting bait, for example. Weedless hooks are essential for many types of vegetation, while stout, heavy hooks are required for big pike or lunker catfish.

Always err towards a smaller hook when choosing the right one for a particular rig. I’ve seen far more big fish landed on small hooks than the other way around. Oversized hooks can ruin rigs that are otherwise perfectly serviceable by changing the angle of the dangle and preventing bites.

SNAPS & SWIVELS

A variety of high-quality swivels and snaps are a pro guide’s best friend. They’ll help you pivot from finesse rigs to cranks or spinners in seconds. Just as importantly, they alleviate line twist and save you a lot of unnecessary tying. I’m particularly fond of snap swivels for hot-swapping different baits and rigs when time is of the essence with clients in the boat. I also use them in some unconventional ways.

There are many opinions floating around about where you should and shouldn’t use a snap swivel, but honestly, most of that is just splitting hairs. The most important thing to understand about a snap swivel is that it will have little to no effect on your presentation, as long as everything that follows it weighs more than the swivel itself. For example, some anglers cite a snap swivel’s supposed negative effects on the action of stick- and crankbaits. But if you chose the right snap, the effect is negligible, making zero difference to the fish chasing it. I use snap swivels for anything I can get away with.

I also pre-tie a supply of light finesse rigs that can be easily snapped on and off the mainline, rather than tying them on directly every time. I guarantee you’ll hook up more often by quickly getting those rigs in the water when fish are under the boat.

WEIGHTS

Simple split-shots or bell sinkers, specialty finesse weights for drop-shotting or Texas rigs, three-ounce monsters for long-lining, and micro tungsten weights all have their time and place. Small adjustments in weight and placement can turn sniffers into biters, especially on pressured fish. I usually prefer to err on the side of slightly heavier sinkers than I think are actually needed.