Yep, Brad, the sheepshead feed on the barnacles, their jaws are strong enough to crush the shells, and you don't put your finger in their mouth and don't use any of those little flimsy hooks (I prefer a 1-0 steel hook). It's quite common to see them working up and down the pilings (in fact watching for them is how Dad and I often decided where to fish), but only very rarely have we been able to get one to take the bait where we could see him do it. But if I see them working up and down the pilings, I'll let a bait down far enough to get it out of sight and then I'll catch some./w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif And when I was new at it, I lost lots of hooks and sinkers when they'd run around the piling and the barnacles cut the line. I finally learned to quickly pull them away from the piling, and if one did run around the piling, simply hold what you have, don't pull in line and don't let the fish pull line. The fish will usually get off, but you don't lose tackle. Some of my favorite places to fish for them is right against the concrete and/or steel walls around the docks. They'll be feeding on the barnacles there, too, but they don't have anything to run around, so when you hook one, it heads for open water.
