Bream fishing with circle hooks

In today’s video, I will be taking the 1548 tracker grizzly out and trying out fle-fly’s size 2 circle hooks for bream. When it comes to bream fishing, I am currently under the impression that most anglers use size 6 through 10 j hooks. These may differ in color, shank length, and barb count but otherwise, fall into this general category. I am a long-time user of j hooks myself. However, while it's hard to argue against the generally good results these hooks have to offer, I do enjoy trying out new equipment in the hopes of finding something that may be more effective. In this particular instance, I have found my new go-to hook when targeting bream 7 inches and larger.

Fle-Fly’s circle hook truly is a wonderful addition you can make to your panfish tackle box. These hooks are intended to allow fish to hook themselves once they take the bait (in my case live crickets). A few things to keep in mind include but are not limited to: In order for circle hooks to work properly many if not most anglers including myself use a snell knot. This allows the hooks to “curl in” as the fish takes the bait or the angler reels in thus, hooking the fish. This knot will be familiar to catfish anglers and deep sea-dropping saltwater anglers. If you are unfamiliar with this knot, do not worry there are plenty of tutorials available on YouTube that will show and describe the action of this knot better than I can describe here. As an additional side note, the lower the poundage of the monofilament line you use the more difficult it will be to tie this knot due to line memory and the very small size hook and line diameter you will be dealing with.

Placement of your bait on the hook is key. Ensure your bait (wax worms, nightcrawlers, crickets) does not cover the barb of the hook. Place the bait at the lowest point on the hook at the bottom of the circle. This ensures when a bream eats your bait the hook can set properly.

If you're a bass angler this may take some getting used to but you DO NOT set the hook. Allow the fish to take the hook and simply reel down towards it in order to “set the hook”. This will be a tough habit to break for bass anglers and panfish anglers that are accustomed to fishing with j hooks.

The final major reasons to consider circle hooks compared to j hooks are that circle hooks tend to not get hung up as often due to the barb being pointed inward, better hook up ratios (once again speaking from my own experience since using this hook), and much fewer gut hooks leading to a much easier time removing your catch as well as a reduction in fish killed due to deep hooking (I had the problem a good bit with j hooks).

As a final note, this is not an attempt to bash j hooks for panfish; they have a very well deserved reputation over many many years. This is simply my experience and impressions on circle hooks as it does not see significant use in the panfish community. As always, I invite you to form and leave your own opinions as doing so allows me as well as others to learn from them. I do ask that you have common human decency and refrain from being a keyboard warrior or bashing others for their opinions.

Also, Fle-fly if you happen to come across this video and like it, I am certainly open to the idea of working with yall in the future feel free to email me or simply leave a comment.


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Unfortunately, the fle-fly hooks are not available on Amazon. I will put a link to their website as well as some items they have on Amazon.

Fle-Fly website: https://flefly.com/product/bait-boss-...

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