While some of you may remember me from my younger days and thought with this title I might be about to tell a tale about working with rock and roll concerts, this column isn’t about that. It’s about using loop knots and presenting several situations where they are the preferred connection while fishing. Now let’s relax a little, put on our glasses and take a look at several ways of getting looped.
Numerous loop knots are used for a variety of different things, from building leaders to making rigs to attaching lures. I use them mostly for making rigs and attaching lures, so I’ll start with building leaders and go from there.
As I said last month, I am not a fly fisherman, but I know several good ones and am slowly learning a little about it. Loop knots, specifically the Surgeon’s Loop, are a simple and easy way to construct step-down fly-fishing leaders. The pieces can be made modular, in the different sections, with a Surgeon’s Loop on each end. Then, they can be combined very simply, in a loop-to-loop connection, to assemble the sections that are needed for that particular kind of fishing or fishing circumstances, such as stronger winds, tree-lined banks, toothy critters and other challenging situations.
Many wind-on offshore leaders are also made using loop-to-loop connections. Most are made with production loops for connecting them to the running line, but in a pinch they can be made with Surgeon’s Loop or Rapala Loop knots.
Rigs are another place loop knots can be very helpful. For making bottom rigs, I used to primarily use Surgeon’s Loops, but I have found some situations are better served with Dropper Loops. With these two loop knots, I can make a variety of rigs to catch anything from spots in the Intracoastal Waterway to grouper on ledges forty miles offshore.
The primary rig I make is a lighter rig for inshore fishing. It involves using two Surgeon’s loops and can be adapted from a basic 2-drop bottom rig to a single- or double-drop flounder rig or to a speck rig. With this rig, the top loop is small and is to be grabbed by the snap of a snap swivel tied to the end of the line from the rod and reel. The bottom loop is larger and is used to attach the sinker. The loop is passed through the eye of the sinker, and then the sinker is dropped through the loop. This allows you to easily change sinkers as current and depth situations require. The hooks are tied on the ends of the line making the drops, usually using one of the many clinch knots or with Rapala knots for speck rigs. The length of the drops can be varied depending on the type of rig being made.
I used to make my black sea bass, beeliner and grouper rigs similarly, but with the recent regulations requiring circle hooks in federal waters (three to 200 miles offshore), I have modified this rig to one I believe works better. It can still be used with 4- to 6-inch drops and a circle hook, but longer drops often result in fish filching your bait without getting hooked. My new offshore bottom rig has a Surgeon’s Loop at the top and bottom for catching the snap swivel and sinker, but the trailing ends are trimmed at the knot.
Instead of tying the hooks on the line ends, the hooks are now attached to dropper loops that are tied in the line between the Surgeon’s Loops. The Dropper Loops are only six to six inches long, and the hooks are attached the same as the sinker — by running the loop up through the hook eye and then passing the hook through the loop. This stands the hook out from the main line a little, without any slack in the line. With the shorter drop and no slack between the main line and the hook, these rigs produce more hookups when using circle hooks.
My main inshore use of loop knots is attaching lures, jigs, and jigheads. Using a loop connection rather than a tight connection allows the lure to have a little more action and to move more realistically. Gains in fishing are rarely made in leaps and bounds, but in small increments. Attaching lures and jigs with loop knots is one of those small increments that I believe sometimes makes a big difference.
The difference between tying on a lure with a loop and allowing it to flutter back down after being jigged and tying a lure on tight where it simply drops to the bottom is often just enough difference to entice a strike from a fish that might not really be hungry and might only be window-shopping otherwise. When the fish are hungry and competing for food, it probably doesn’t matter much, but on the days that the fish are finicky, subtle differences often make the difference between catching and merely standing on the bow of the boat and casting.
To produce this little bit of extra action is why I attach most lures, jigs and jigheads with a loop knot. If you tie the knot correctly, it is just as strong, so that isn’t an issue. Think about it; have you ever heard someone say a lure moves too realistically or has too much action? More important, I believe the fish prefer more realistic action.
Another reason for attaching the lure or jig with a loop knot is it always creates an in-line pull for setting the hook. If a tight knot has been twisted to the side and a fish hits, the angler’s strike could pull the hook at an odd angle that may result in a miss or a weak hookset. When a lure tied with a loop comes tight, it always pulls directly in line with the line. I believe this helps hook fish. I also believe I get more strikes and have a better hook-up ratio when using lures tied on with loops than on knots that are pulled tight.
I’ve experimented with using several different loop knots to attach lures and have decided I prefer the Rapala Loop Knot for any lure that has a fixed eye (clinch-style knots work well for attaching to split rings, as the split ring allows movement). This knot passes the tag end of the line back on itself three times without becoming noticeably larger and doesn’t slip. It was a bit difficult to tie until I became comfortable with it, and now my fingers work better than my eyes can see. Even better, I have not yet had a Rapala Knot slip. You can find a 6-stage diagram in the instructions section of the Customer Service page of the Rapala website at www.rapala.com.
Check out loop knots and try them some when fishing. They are good tools for building rigs and really help increase the action of many lures. You can often see an increase in lure action just by dropping the lure in the water. The fish see it too! It might not make a lot of difference when the bite is red hot, but it will help attract strikes when the fishing is slow — and to most of us, that is when it matters most.
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