Size of your Fishing Reels

Hi Peoples,

I had an interesting question put to me recently. It was about the size of reels people use for light line spinning e.g. for bream on light lures and whiting... The argument, as happens when opinions are put into the mix, some of us say that lighter is better and others like a heavier outfit...

The argument for a heavier outfit was interesting. When i say heavier i mean using a 2500 sized reel on a 2-4kg 7 footer... The reason they opted for a heavier reel was 'in case' a bigger than average fish got hooked they could land it. By this bigger than average meant hooking by-catch. Now my issue with this is two-fold.

Firstly, fishing equipment is such finely tuned and balanced that catering for a mulitude of species with the one outfit will negate the performance that can be achieved if it was species specific. Putting a 2500 sized reel will throw out the balance of the small flick stick, make it bottom heavy, lead to wrist fatigue and generally feel poor in the hand. Yes, you might be able to knock over bigger fish with a 2500 sized reel but come on. In that premise you would need to go a heavier line class and therefore restrict the finesse appeal to catch you smaller quarry. If you stuck with a lighter line class, where's the benefit??? The only one i see is line capacity, but just chase the fish! I have never had a fish spool me...ever!

Secondly, the drag settings on a 1000 sized reel will never be fully used anyway let alone a 2500... The 4lb and 6lb line classes are too light to be used to thier full capacity on a 2500 sized reel...usually. Most of us will over ever run max 1-2kgs of drag thru our bream rods, and trust me thats over estimating it too. Do a test for yourself and run 1kg of drag thru your 2-4kg spin stick. It will be at max load. So the drag will never be fully utilised anyaway on 2500. Most new 1500 and 2000 sized reels run 3 or 4kgs of drag nowadays and thats plenty.

I use a 2004 luvias and 2000 certate. These are the max size i will run on light line finesse gear. The luvias is substantially smaller than the certate and is my ultra finesse reel. It weighs a mere 180grams and has 3kgs of drag.. Its gun and i have knocked over my fair share of jew and sambos on it. It can handle the heat all day, let alone a bream!

So will a lighter reel do the job better??? As Greeny (a fellow fisho writer) says, a lure is a lie told by a fisherman to a fish. In this deciept the lie needs to look authentic, smell authentic and taste authentic. The movement of the lure needs to be realistic. In order for this to happen the jighead needs to be as light as possible, the leader needs to be light, the main line light, the rod light and sensitive and a reel to match this integrated system. In this instance i cannot forsee why you would dampen the feel of the set-up just to cater for by-catch. If something comes along and spools you...good luck i say. That would be enuf fuel for me to get out there and keep trying.

So i guess my advice, and take it with a grain of salt, is to go as light as possible with all your equipment. Fish light and fish it hard. You'll be surprised at how far you can push your light gear...and the fun factor goes thru the roof too.