Aberdeen Hooks

Hooks seem to be a current topic so…

Why aren’t Aberdeen hooks more popular?

When I grew up they were all over the place …of course…those were my worm days.

But it seems to me they would make a good dry/wet hook…say for a hopper …light weight…nice sized gap…straight eye…inexpensive

What am I missing…hard to find now…

Edit…just did a google & checked Cabela’s …where I got them last…they seem to be a little easier to find and a little more expensive now…but I still wonder why we don’t ty on them more?

…seemed like that’s all I had was Aberdeens…
din’t know they were called that till years later.
Still have a bunch of 'em somewhere…very old
now…stuck in a thermos bottle cork
that I found floating somewhere…
maybe scare those up and tye some
streamers, or use them behind proposed
tube flies that I want to tye. Noticed them
at Cabella’s also…and on the bay for cheap.

Good post duckster…

MontanaMoose

When you say Aberdeen are you refering to the basic round shape?
Most of the new Mustad R series are just that … a round bend.

Now what about the sneck? looking at the old catalogs, many of the old trout flies were on the sneck (square) bend.

It seemed to me that hook brands were more regional. Michigan seemed to be heavy for Mustad, other areas went for other brands, Any ideas on this from say, 1950’s on? :slight_smile:

I tie a bunch of my warmwater flies on aberdeen style hooks. $.88 for 20 is what I usually pay and they work for me. The ones I use have the round bend, but also a longer shank, not sure what the actual dimension is but I’d guess around 2-3x long. Size 8 aberdeens make the perfect size wooly bugger for bluegill for me.

The only time I found a problem was when one straightened out when I tried stopping a big carp in a strong current. I switched to heavier wire hooks for my carp flies since then.

Brands and shapes are all over the board.

A sproat, limerick, aberdeen, sneck, kirby, bass, virginia trout, etc all being shapes varied from maker to maker. Also some of the shapes were also hook makers (kirby, o’shaughnessy) and some of the hooks were named for where they were first made and changed shape over time (aberdeen, limerick).

Check out Ronn Lucas’s web site go to old hooks and you’ll see some fantastic pictures of a variety of hooks, makers and shapes.

http://www.ronnlucassr.com

Those old ‘standard’ aberdeen light wire hooks are still around…you just don’t see them much in the stores anymore.

I’m also surprised by how few fly tyers use the plain old ‘aberdeen’ style bait hooks (I’m not talking about he ‘bend’ shape, but what many generations of crappie and bluegill fishermen grew up calling a ‘minner hook’). These were long shank light wire hooks, I’d say aroud 3X in their ‘normal’ configuration. They have been around for years and lend themselves well to many patterns.

Both Mustad (unless this whole discontinue thing affects them too, don’t know that yet) and Eagle Claw still make and market them. I bought a bunch of VMC aberdeen hooks from the ‘for sale’ board here a few years ago. Great hooks. Eagle Claw even makes one that is an ‘EL-extra long’ version, looks like around 5X long. You can get them in a wide size range and in gold, nickle, and bronze finishes. Lots of ice fishermen use the gold or nickle for making ice jigs.

I use them a lot for streamers, nymphs, and terrestials for trout, poppers and gurgler type flies for bass and panfish, and lots of other odd applications. These are ‘the’ go to ‘perfect’ hook for foam spiders (which should probably be illegal for warm water 'gill fishing).

At around $4-$5 per hundred they are a good value hook.

One of the ‘selling points’ of these hooks for bait fishing is that you can ‘straighten’ them out to get them unhung, then bend them back into shape and keep fishing. They will straighten out on a fish, so you have to pay attention to how much pressure you put on them. I’ll keep my tippet to 4x or lighter using these, and then it’s no problem.

One of my favorite atributes of these hooks is that you CAN bend them without hurting them…I use the small VMCs to bend into a shape similar to the Tiemco 200R/2312 for chronimd patterns. Nice long flexible shank with sharp point and strong round bend.

I use some of the larger sizes for making crawfish flies. I bend the shank down a bit for these, and the aberdeens allow that without damage.

Buddy

I tie a lot bass and panfish patterns on the Aberdeen crappie hook. I’ll use both the gold and bronze hooks. I’ve found the gold ones in Walmart, K-mart and Dick’s Sporting goods locally, but in limited sizes. If you want to see a better collection of sizes and brands you need to get a catalog like Jann’s Netcraft or Barlow’s. Even Gamakatsu makes an Aberdeen hook. Cabela’s and Bass Pro usually carry just Mustad and Eagle Claw. In fact, I’m getting ready to order some 3/0 ones from Barlow’s to use for some bass and pike flies. When they’re that size they can handle a small pike. The other hook mentioned is the 6 or 7XL, light wire round bend hook, what they called, when I was in college in west Tennessee, a cricket hook. Used them a lot fishing for bream with crickets among the cypress knees on Reelfoot Lake. I use these for small to medium pencil poppers for panfish since it’s tough to find a fly hook with the length and light weight to make a small one. You don’t see them any stores around here, but they’re carried in all the catalogs mentioned as a cricket hook.
There are a lot of non-fly fishing hooks out there that can be used for fly tying. A lot of my bass bugs are tied on Gamakatsu light wire worm hooks and spinner bait trailer hooks. the Daichi 2461 is an excellent round bend streamer hook and popper hook. Many of the drop shot hooks are good for tying small baitfish patterns. I even found a sharp, out of the box, Mustad hook, #3777, that I use for damsel fly and dragonfly patterns, and boobie flies.

And I thought I was the only person tying flies on Aberdeen hooks; no. 6’s are large enough for small popping bugs, 6’s and 8’s make good gurgle pops, grasshoppers. Back when I first started tying I modified a pair of pliers to kink the hooks, you can open up the bend to get beads on and 98% of the time bend the eye down or up if you like. A no. 8 Eagle Claw is almost the same size as a no. 14 nymph hook. Walmart has their own brand Renegade.

I landed two 5 1/2+ LMB; a couple of 7+ grass carp and a channel cat 24" on flies tied on Aberdeen hooks, no compliant so far.