To bead or not to bead (glow beads)

Glow beads always with shrimp flies, but what about a trap rig?

I use a lot of trap rigs for fishing bigger baits like whole squid, kingfish, smelts, mackerel, or whatever bites a sabiki. Sometimes I put one or two glow beads ahead of the first hook, and sometimes another glow bead with the stinger. Maybe if I forget the first bead, I put one with the stinger. Sometimes I forget the glow beads. Been doing this for years and I'm not sure if it makes a difference or not.

Sometimes I wonder if a bead only with the first hook would encourage fish to strike in that area, as I prefer solid hookups on the lead hook. I dunno.  Last time out, I found some tooth marks that seemed like the critter bit carefully in between the two hooks and tried to pull the squid away, but maybe I give 'em too much credit for brains.

Does anyone have feelings, beliefs, observations, superstitions, or rational justifications for the use/non-use of glow beads on trap rigs for lings/halibut? Bay v Ocean?

Thanks for sharing any thoughts.

I use beads to protect my eyelet and knots mostly. Or below a hoochi above my first hook to give it some flare and to protect that hook. I got a huge bag of the clear ones for eyelet protection and some green ones for lures, but I kinda want to get some nice glass ones.

... but I kinda want to get some nice glass ones.

Where would you get those? Some of the cheap plastic ones disintegrate and make a mess.

I always use beads with hootchies, but otherwise not. And I prefer red, which are probably invisible at any reasonable depth, so they are just there to protect the knot and/or position the hootchie properly.

I like chartreuse glow beads always use em...

I also always use a small 3mm or 4mm bead on my trap rigs! I tend to use fluorescent orange, green, pink or yellow. I planned on trying glow beads and have a pack for the next time out. I’ve done tests with one rod having a bead and the other without. The rod with the bead gets hit way more often then the rod with out one. I have thought of many different reasons why but I gave up trying to figure it out and just put one bead on the main hook. I haven’t tried putting on the stinger hooks because I try to make it less obvious. I haven’t used glass beads for trap rigs but I use them for long lining salmon in the river because it acts like a weight and keeps the hook on the bottom of the river. I don’t see any benefit of using glass in the ocean since you are normally trying to keep your bait just off the bottom so it’s not getting beat up but the bead is so small that it probably won’t affect frozen bait as much. I use to get glass and acrylic beads from a local craft shop but found it’s just easier to order beads from Amazon. Some of the local fishing stores also sell them but you get way less for the $. That’s just my 2 cents…

The glow beads couldn't hurt. I've fished for Salmon on the AR here in Sac before sunrise for years with glow jigs, glow Flatfish and drifting glow beads. The hook up rate is much better with glow products. It stands to reason that they would help in the ocean. I've caught a ton of RF & Lings with glow jigs too. Go for it.