The barbed vs. barbless hook has been a bit of an issue here over the past few years I'd say. The regulations said that you had to crush the barb a few years ago. Then the next year they accidentally left that out, and barbed hooks were fine again. So as far as I know the rule now is that barbed hooks are OK, but they recommend barbless and hope people use them.
I pretty much only flyfish so I just crush the barb. You might lose a fish here or there because of that, but I don't care. The thing is that I also only do catch and release fishing, so the barb makes it easier on the fish to be released with minimal damage. I should say that most of the guides probably don't crush the barb for the average customer. They would rather have their clients catching as opposed to having the fish shake the hook.
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