Any premium brand. Get WF floating for reds. WF stands for weight forward and helps load the rod for short casts.
Any premium brand. Get WF floating for reds. WF stands for weight forward and helps load the rod for short casts.
"hunting should be a challenge and a passion not a way of making a living or a road to fame"
Rubberhead
If it's labelled 7-8, go with 8 line.
"hunting should be a challenge and a passion not a way of making a living or a road to fame"
Rubberhead
and, led, definitely WF and heavy. dont skimp on line (says the guy with the $50 reel)
Ugh. Stupid people piss me off.
Rio Outbound short
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"The real reason fish jump - they don't have a middle finger!"
There is an Orvis store in Myrtle Beach, if you are near there. The Recon is a great rod for the money.
At least I'm housebroken.
I saw thousands of fiddlers out on the sand flats this morning. What month usually do the fish figure that out? Presuming it stays warm?
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Just because there are fiddlers does not normally gurantee reds. You just gotta pole around until you find a school and they will frequent that general area at all tides, every single day and will slightly change their location based on the tide. With all this warm weather I wouldn't put it past them to start getting up on those flats in a month or so. I caught a tailer here (Charleston) last January when it got up to like 75 degrees. Around this time of the year at least in Charleston the reds are best to target on the low tide flats schooled up. Winter is a good time to fish the low tide, Summer is good for both.
The biggest difference between a $200 fly rod and a $500+ fly rod is one thing. The warranty
Last edited by pawleydux; 02-13-2018 at 12:44 PM.
Jake, the reds won't really get up on the sand flats.
They prefer good deep water escape off the flats so look for short grass with small feeder creeks interspersed.
The big sand is kinda no-mans lands!
Not saying some won't and there is some crossover b/w what I'm telling you to look for and the sand but in general if they don't have good ingress and egress, move along!
Last edited by Calibogue; 02-13-2018 at 07:47 PM.
\"I never saw a wild thing feel sorry for itself. A small bird will drop dead frozen from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself.\" <br />D.H. LAWRENCE
Buy a good reel, you can get by on a midrange rod.
USCG Cutterman
"The best things in life make you sweaty"
- Edgar Allen Poe
“We need the tonic of wildness...At the same time that we are earnest to explore and learn all things, we require that all things be mysterious and unexplorable, that land and sea be indefinitely wild, unsurveyed and unfathomed by us...”
― Henry David Thoreau
Think so? I've found that unless I have to cast long distances I'd rather have a good reel with a good drag. I've caught plenty of fish, I'm no pro though.
USCG Cutterman
I'm with Dawhoo. The rod and line is what helps you get it to the fish accurately. A reel is only there to hold your line. You can get by with a reel with no drag by palming the spool.
It's not hard to find a decent cheap reel that has a good (enough) drag, especially if your only talking about spottails.
When you evaluate a reel, crank down the drag knob a bit and, most importantly, feel how smoothly it starts. If it has any hesitation before it gets smooth, look elsewhere. Try a bunch and you'll quickly understand what is meant by "start-up drag". It's that very first, extra bit of static resistance that some poorly built reels have that will pop your line.
If you're going after bonefish, tarpon or any other notoriously long running fish, you also need to consider the actual area of the drag washers. Big running fish can burn up a reel with small drag surfaces just like driving with your emergency brakes on. Spottails are not long running fish and rarely get you into the backing. You're usually fighting them very close up so there is less line stretch to help buffer quick jerks. Start-up drag is even more important when the fish is close.
Some of the other things that differentiate reels are sealed bearings and drags, spool diameter and width.
Sealed drags and bearing are a great idea because you are eventually going to submerge your reel no matter how carefully you are wading.
Big diameter reels help you gain line quickly and keep a more consistent drag pressure as you get deeper into the line. They also minimize the loop memory of your line. A narrow spool has a lot of change in diameter as the line pays out. As the diameter gets smaller, it has less leverage to overcome the drag. The trend has been really big diameter reels with wide and well ventilated spools. With the extra width, you have to be more careful to levelwind the line on as you reel in. With a well-ventilated spool, it's easier to rinse your line and backing without unspooling it into a bucket after every outing. I have an old garden hose reel I use for unspooling fly line and backing for cleaning.
There were reds tailing last night in the grass. I walked the dog down after we got back from church and pop there was a tail. I went home and grabbed a pole and went back down to see more. I had a spinning rod and even then it was so damn windy I missed my shot.
But they were there.
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