ruined flies keep the hook or no

[Tim Shovel 0]

I am new to tying and something crossed my mind, when your fly gets banged up do you cut off the materials and reuse the hook or do you toss it?

[Yeti 0]

It all depends on the condition of the hook. if the hook point is still good and wouldn't need sharpening and there isn't any rust, I just throw it in a box of "to be disassembled" flies and get to them at a later date. A lot of times I will just farm old flies for the bead heads or eyes.

[SilverCreek 0]

Cut the material off with a single edged razor blade.

[Kirk Dietrich 0]

I'm kind of a hook fanatic and am always buying hooks and often buying hooks I think I'm out of only to realize when the new hooks come that I already have a box/pack. So, I don't usually worry about saving hooks from beat up flies - besides, I usually lose the fly to a fish or a tree before it gets to beat up to fish. If it does get to beat up and scraggly to fish, I usually just keep it as a souvenier/reminder of how good the pattern was.

Now, I'll tell you that on some of my flies that have epoxy coating such as spoon flies and poppers, I will touch up the epoxy coating if they get dinked or worn out. Usually after the spoon catches two to three dozen redfish, it needs a recoating of epoxy that will carry it for another two dozen fish.

If you're strapped for money and the hook is in good condition like Yeti said, go ahead and save it.

[wschmitt3 0]

When I recycle hooks from damaged flies or ones that I tied and later decided not to keep for what ever reason I usually cut the material off with an exacto knife. Be careful though a 20, 30 or even 50 cent hook isnt worth a nasty gash.

[phg 0]

Agree with most of what has been said. If the hook is in good condition, there's no point in throwing it away. It's easy enough to cut off the fletching and recycle the hook. Single edged razor or X-acto knife works well for me.

[tidewaterfly 0]

I don't like wasting anything, so agree with the others that if the hooks in good condition, I'll reuse it. Otherwise, it gets tossed in the recycle bin to be disposed of properly.

[Crackaig 0]

I tend not to. I could give you the BS of "I don't have the non destructive test equipment to ascertain if the hook is damaged or not, you can't tell visually". The reality is though, I buy hooks by the thousand or more. Have little enough time to tie for myself so I find it just isn't worth even the small amount of time and effort it takes to do it. I do though have the economy of scale in the buying of hooks to make the cost so low as to be not worth it. Also I know if I leave it on the desk for when my boat partner visits it will disappear anyway.

 

I have one customer though, who has a lucky salmon hook! I kid you not. He brings it back each year for a new dressing, sometimes twice. It isn't that he he can't afford a new hook or anything. That one has caught him lots of salmon, and, in its time, has been part of many different dressings. It's just his lucky hook. Who am I to argue. I take the cost of a hook off the usual price of the fly, and tie it for him. Can't be any fairer than that.

 

Cheers,

C.

[flytire 0]

depends on if you want to save a few pennies for the hook your destroyed fly is tied on

 

I mean how many flies get destroyed to the point where you have to scrape of the materials? 1-5? 5-10? 10-20? etc....

[agn54 0]

If the hook is in good condition I'll often scrape it and reuse it, but that depends on the fly as well. If it had an epoxy head or some part that will make it harder to scrape I'll just chuck it. As for saving pennies on the hooks, some of the saltwater hooks can get pretty expensive, over a dollar a hook in some cases, so if the hook is in good shape it is usually worth it to reuse it. Also, if you get into a school of mackerel or bluefish, you could have plenty of flies to scrape from just one outing

[Tim Shovel 0]

Thanks for the advice, I'll probably be fishing bass and pike, maybe salmonids in the fall. Thanks again

[Adam Saarinen 0]

If your talking about something like a partridge salar? Ofcourse! Don't throw that away!

[mikechell 0]

I know it's a selfish way to think ... but recycling has never been a high priority of mine. I do buy as cheaply as I can, so my hooks aren't "top of the line". A few times when I really didn't like a fly I'd just tied, I've thrown the whole thing away. If I actually get enough fish on one fly to destroy it, it's going in the garbage.

That said, my favorite top water is a foam body fly with a replaceable foam body. The foam can be destroyed on one fish, or one bad snag. With those, since I am not striping off materials, I will put new bodies on them several times.

[agn54 0]

Mike, you got a picture of that fly? It sounds like a Bob's Banger, or at least it has the same principle of the replaceable head

[mikechell 0]

Go to the SBS forum and look for my "flip-flop hopper".