Pain, pressure, and one hard pull: Hook removal done right

CFStrians: Content warning: This one's a little gnarly. If you're on the squeamish side, maybe skip. But, in the end, things wound up being less gnarly than they could have been. So, worth knowing what to do when it happens.

Our Summer Term intro class fished the ponds yesterday, and did great. A lot of firsts: first fish on a fly rod, on a dry fly, largemouth bass.

But, for me, there was a special first.

First major league hook removal. As in, "if we don't get this right, it's Urgent Care."

1. How it all went down
2. What you can do if you find yourself in that situation
3. How to avoid this in the first place (ahem, barbless hooks)

It was just after lunch, and we had switched to using streamers. I'd given a little talk about why we use barbless hooks. And how that becomes an even more important factor with bigger flies. Our crew was warned.

As students fanned out across the complex, I took a few minutes to myself to get recombobulated, then sauntered off to follow them.

A man, little boy in tow, intercepted me as I walked down the main connecting path.

He was my age, wearing a well-worn sleeveless Dead tee that had seen better decades. The boy, about four, a big shock of thick curly hair.

"Are you the fly-fishing guy?" He had a chipped front tooth and a crooked smile that said he was in a jam, not just into jam bands.

I nodded. I suppose I was the fly-fishing guy.

He presented his left hand, in a sort of crooked greeting. In his right, a pair of rusty pliers. "I'm stuck pretty bad."

It sure wasn't anything resembling a fly. He had a big spoon hanging from a size 2 treble hook. Like the image at the top.

Said hook? Buried in the side of his thumb. We're talking a hook about the size of a quarter. Half-inch or so of hook plus barb.

My stomach tightened. I've stuck myself with flies. I've watched videos of hook removals before. But this was real: real flesh, real pain, real fallout if I botched it.

I'm not sure how he got it there. Starting an inquest wouldn't have been productive. (Nor would have documenting, which is why we don't have pictures.)

But here we were.

A quick tangent on hook anatomy

In fly-fishing, we use single hooks, like the one below. When the fish eats the fly, the hook is set. (Either by us, or by the fish.) And the point penetrates its mouth.

Here's the thing with barbs, though: When it goes in past the barb, it's much harder to pull out without tearing something. This is the same, whether it's a fish's mouth, or yours.

Now, imagine a lure with three of these hooks welded together, and you have a treble hook. The pointy problem we were dealing with.

Rejoining the hook removal action on the pathway

The bottom line came into focus. I was the only step between this guy and Urgent Care and a multi-hundred dollar bill.

On immediate diagnosis, we'd have to yank it out.

Technique here is counterintuitive. Common sense might say, if you have a hook in a meaty bit, like an earlobe, push the hook through. Then cut off the barb, slide it back out.

That might work in one or two places (your earlobes). In the rest of your body? That additional piercing is bad for business. It creates a bigger wound, and more tissue trauma.

"The only way out is through" is exactly the wrong strategy here.

And with our case, there was no pushing it through: the thumb bone and thumbnail are in the way. The hook has to come out the same way it went in.

To do that, we have to account for the barb, which prevents the fish from coming off the hook. So, we need to remove the hook by pulling it out. Enter the loop technique.

How it works is pretty simple, if somewhat magical: You take a loop of line, and put it under the hook. While applying pressure to the shank of the hook with one hand, around the eye, you yank on the loop. Hard. At just the right angle.

In theory, the dual pressure elements pop the hook out, with little tearing. The sudden force stretches the skin, and creates a channel through which the hook pops back out, without the barb catching. And it is painless. So they say.

In practice...well, in practice, you're standing with a nervous dad whose fishing trip with his kid just got serious. Who's dealing with a non-trivial amount of pain, so much so that he asked a total stranger to yank the hook out on some vague authority of being the fly-fishing guy.

I shared my opinion, that we'd have to pop it out with the loop. He agreed, and motioned his head over to the group of old guys on the disabled angler platform.

"Those guys said that's what they thought too, but they ain't never done it before, and don't want to."

Removing a fishing hook with a loop of line: a first timer's reflection

I leveled with him: I've never done this before either. But I've watched a fair number of videos in case it did happen. I know how it works, and feel confident about it working for us.

"Oh man, let's do it."