Look at the two hooks above.
The top one is a TMC800s; the one below is a Daichi X452. They are both excellent size-six saltwater hooks. If it’s not clear from the photograph, the TMC is a thicker-wire hook than than the Daichi.
Now, which one should you use?
The answer may be dependent on which fish you are targeting.
In Puget Sound, we spend most of the year fishing for sea run cutthroat trout and resident Coho. In general, most of the fish are smaller than around 14 to 16 inches and do not need a large thick hook to land them – making the Daichi a better choice. Now, for migrating Coho I’d go with the thicker hook.
I had noticed that when I started using the Daichi hook, with its thinner wire and much sharper chemically-sharpened tip, that I was drawing less blood from the fish and the hook was easier to remove – releasing the fish quicker and with less damage; giving it a better chance it will be around for the next fly fisher.
And perhaps a choice of hooks reflects the choices to be made in the larger issues facing us today.
It’s become clear to me that it’s long past time to stop using the term “climate change”, which is a euphemism to avoid inflaming those clinging to dying industries or outdated political ideologies.
The correct term should be “climate crisis.”
The hurricanes, forest fires, and mudslides of last year, and this winter’s storms, have demonstrated that the sometime-in-the-future climate change is here now – constituting an existential crisis.
Elsewhere on the planet, the effects of this crisis are even more clear.
American television does a poor job reporting things happening elsewhere in the world,except for terrorism, wars, and royal weddings.
That’s not the case in other countries. The CBC had an excellent report a few nights ago on the drought in Africa that’s impacting the future of Cape Town – the second most populous city in South Africa.
The drought has reduced the water in the city’s reservoirs to the point that city leaders now speak of Day Zero – the day when the municipal water taps run dry. There will still be water from deep groundwater, requiring people to walk to the 200 distribution points, and there has been a rush to build desalination plants.
And there have been conservation efforts. Residents of Cape Town have been ordered to use no more than 13 gallons per day. That may sound like a lot of water, but in the US the average daily use per person is estimated at between 80 and 100 gallons. Think about how you would get by on 13 gallons of water.
The exact timing of Day Zero is a bit unclear; it was originally thought to be April of this year. Due to conservation and augmentation efforts it has now been pushed out to 2019. Read more here.
But until the drought ends the residents of Cape Town will be living this particular climate crisis.
As with Cape Town, people everywhere will face a Day Zero.
It might be the day when there is no more skiing due to snow levels rising above the tops of resorts.
It might be the day your favorite sports fishery is permanently closed.
It might be the day having an oceanfront house might not be possible no matter how much money you have.
It might be the day the electrical grid drops as severe storms destroy large segments of the transmission and distribution system.
It might be the day there are no ocean fish to be caught for consumption.
It might be the day there is no water to irrigate the lands used for grains and vegetables.
For any of these, and more, the problems may be unsolvable – and our future grim.
But we each have to do what we can. It is about the choices we make regarding our impact on the environment and in the places we live. And hopefully that may be enough to give us time to rethink and rework how we live on this planet.
It starts with conserving water – and using the lightest hook we can.
