What size of Texas hook to choose for a soft lure?
For those who wonder whatHow to choose your Texan hook size for a soft lure, here is a simple summary so as not to get lost in your choice and your purchase.
In this period when the aquatic vegetation is reborn, it becomes more and more difficult to make your lure swim correctly without clinging to the seagrass beds. In addition, branches, submerged trees and any other obstacle are so many caches of choice for predators on the prowl. Faced with this, the most effective solution to get these fish is to use a texan hook on your soft lure. Which Texan hook to choose? What size Texan hook to choose according to the soft lure? Here are so many simple questions, but sometimes not very obvious, that we want to answer.
Texan hook: an all-terrain hook for soft lures
A Texan hook is above all a hook dedicated to fishing in crowded places. These are generally provided with obstacles, grass beds, rocks, wood, in short any spot where a normal hook would catch on the 1er launch.
A Texan hook has the particularity of having an elbow in front of the attachment ring. Therefore, the shank is more or less offset from this eyelet. This makes it possible to camouflage the tip of the hook in the body of the lure with the shank underneath and thus to avoid as much as possible the risks of catching your soft lure.
When a fish attacks and closes its mouth on the lure, the pressure of its jaw on the shank and the lure brings out the tip of the hook and allows the fish to be hooked effectively.
Before knowing the size of a Texan hook for a soft lure, it is important to define the different types of texan hooks.
Several forms of Texan hooks exist on the market. Each shape generally corresponds to a specific type of soft lure.
Texan offset hook
A Texan offset hook is a Texan hook with the axis of the eyelet and the point offset but parallel. This type of Texan hook is perfect for thin and threadlike soft baits such as worms or slugs. The tip of the Texan hook is angled at 45 °, which is perfect for self-hooking a fish.
On the other hand, we recommend that you reserve this type of assembly for surface fishing or very little congested areas, otherwise the risk of snagging will increase.
Texan Wide Gap hook
A Texan wide gap hook is a Texan hook whose axis of the eyelet is at the same level as the axis of the point. For this, this hook has a large rounded opening at the level of the shank.
The point of the Texan hook protrudes more widely outside the lure and thus generally allows for fewer misses when hooking. In addition, the point being parallel to the back of the lure, it allows us in very crowded environments to transplant the point into the skin of the latter. This montage says “Tex-skinned” thus minimizes the risk of snagging.
When attacking a fish, however, the horizontal position in relation to the lure requires strong hooking for maximum efficiency, especially on large-mouthed predators.
This type of Texan hook is perfect for thick, large section soft baitss such as shads or the creatures. In addition, wide gap hooks are the most versatile in our eyes. Indeed, they can be used with all types of soft lures.
As the first visual of our article indicates, Texan hooks are now available in a multitude of variations. A Texas hook for a soft lure can now be weighted, have a paddle or even a screw. However, they all respond to the same morphology: offset or wide gap.
Now that you know the difference between shapes, we now get to the heart of the matter: the choice of the size of a Texan hook according to the soft lure
How to choose your Texan hook size for a soft lure?
Here is a summary allowing you to easily find your Texan hook size for soft lure
| Soft lure size cm | Soft lure size inch | Texan hook size |
| 5 cm | 2 '' | #6 or #4 |
| 7.5 cm | 3 '' | #1 or #1 / 0 |
| 8.9 cm | 3.5″ | #1/0 |
| 10 cm | 4 '' | #1 / 0 or #2 / 0 |
| 12.5cm | 5 '' | #2 / 0 or #3 / 0 |
| 15 cm | 6 '' | # 4/0 or #5 / 0 |
| 17.5 cm | 7 '' | #5 / 0 or #6 / 0 |
Of course, this table can have small variations depending on the morphology of the lure or your fishing habits. Nevertheless, this table will allow you to respond to 95% situations.
As a general rule, the rule we follow is that the size of your Texan hook should not exceed half the length of your soft lure. This rule avoids restricting the swimming of your soft lure. Some even recommend using Texan hooks that are only a third of the length of the soft lure.
In any case, know that when a predator attacks your lure, it generally tries to swallow it in one bite. It would therefore be useless to put a hook that is too long thinking that it will have a better chance of setting your fish.
Useful links linked to this article “texan hook size for soft lure”:
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About The Author
Rodmaps
Rodmaps is above all the story of Nicolas and Matthieu, two friends passionate about fishing. Since our childhood, our passion drives us to travel through France and to travel around the world in search of adventure and trophy fish. Through Rodmaps, we want to share our passion for fishing with as many people as possible and make people discover the joys of this sport around us, because yes, fishing is a sport!