Fishing with KVD..............................hooks.

[Garry2rs]

I was at Wally World for a few things and strolled through the fishing department. No surprise that! But what did surprise me was to see six-packs of the new Mustad KVD Elite treble hooks. These hooks are just showing up for sale in US on-line stores so to see them in a chain store in a small town in Canada was a shock!

The hooks are Mustad's ultra-point, triple-grip bend in a 1-extra strong, 2-extra short shank version. KVD has said that he changes the hooks on some lures, especially the stock ones on his Red Eye Shad rattle baits. However until this year the hook he changed to has been his secret.

Ckick to see them.

I use rattle baits a lot, they are a great bait anywhere you fish and will catch virtually everything that swims. Every company makes their own version, but no matter what brand you choose, the problem has always been that it's very hard to keep big fish on.

On his web-site KVD said that he has been replacing the #4 standard rattle bait hooks with #2's from this series. The 2X-short design makes the hook about the same length, but is stronger and wider in the base. To try them out, I bought a six-pack of #2's and another of #4's. My idea was to change the hooks on three of my favourite Summer bass baits. Ones that I feel have some hook-up issues.

My test baits would be a Strike King rattle bait, a Kooper Live Target in the Bluegill crank bait series and a Rebel Pop "R." I tied three scraps of feather to the new tail hook of the Pop"R" to replace the dressed standard hook.

Yesterday Buck and I put the boat in the closest lake and went for a ride. To give ourselves the best shot at both types of Bass we chose a long bay with a rocky shoreline and subsurface weed beds, that ended in a log and stump filled marsh.

Unfortunately I left the camera at home...blush...but I can tell you that we thought we had hit a Grand-Slam when we hooked a SMBass, a LMBass, the WGSP(Rock Bass) a Perch and a small Musky all on the same Rattle bait!

For those of you who know the area, I suppose that we should have gone trolling for a Walleye at that point, to make it a true grand-slam. But because, sporting-wise, I consider Walleye to be as exciting as rubber-boots I never thought of it until we were back home.

When we changed lures we went on the catch a 2.3 LMBass and a 1.5 SMB on the Bluegill pattern Live Target and a very nice 3.5 LMB when the Pop"R" spit water over a sunken log.

What they say about the hooks being sharp and holding on tight is true! The best SMB. gave an unexpected wiggle and the golf glove took the hook points up to the bard, but saved my hand...You really do need pliers to remove them most of the time.

These might not be the best hooks for every lure, but on these three baits I like them a lot.
Garry2R's

[rodnreel]

Great report, Garry. I've been using these hooks on my crankbaits and since switching have not had a fish shake off yet. When I wanted to switch out trebles I usually bought Gammy's, but am really impressed with the Mustad's and think I'll stick with the triple grips for a while.