It's Snapper Time!

YellowHammer · Reply #25 - Re: It's Snapper Time!

I was using a slip bobber rig for speckled trout last week, shrimp make a popping sound when they flee from predators, and the slip bobber popping cork, about the size of a corn dog, really brings them in. So bring the slip bobbers!

Although I have never gotten in front of a Bluefin, yes, these style reels are built for that and more. As a matter of fact, on one of the Wicked Tuna shows last season, Cap Marciano started fishing with his "baby stand up rig" which was an Accurate rod and reel about 1/4 the size of his crazy big tuna tackle, and liked it.

https://accuratefishing.com/collections/saltwater-fishing-reels

Accurate fishing reels,was founded by a family of Aerospace Machinists, and the reels were specifically designed for the multi day, offshore tuna trips from the San Diego Tuna fleet. Customers get on board for a week or more, and the Captain steams for a long ways, they get on big schools of tuna, and many of the customers have to cast live bait for them. They custom build each reel if you want, and they did so on one of mine. They are made in America, and bad to the bone. There are now lots of Japaneses and other copies, but Accurate reels are still arguably the best for the new generation of revolving spool reels.

The power issue @SawyTed talks about is a real issue, crazy heavy drags require a lot of cranking torque and super strong gears. So Accurate reels come with a transmission, a low speed gear ratio that will pull a stump out, and a high speed gear for pulling in about 3 or 4 feet of line per crank. The transmission is shifted on the fly if needed, by pressing a little button on the side of the reel handle. Amazing technology, and super smooth.

I also have some of the new spinning reels, most of mine are Penn, and are literally just a little bigger than my bass reels, and about 1/2 the size of my old school huge spinning reels and have twice the drag and twice the line capacity! A couple of my "new generation" spinning reels has 40 lbs of drag and they are so light that last year, I had my SIL on the boat and we were casting and catching mackerel with 1/2 once jigs. I told my SIL to grab the "light" rod and start casting, and I did the same. I looked up after a couple fish and he was using one of my "heavy" spinning rods that could haul in a dump truck, and when I mentioned it to him that he grabbed the wrong one he said no, it casts and felt lighter than his bass fishing rod back home!

There are lots of videos on the Tube of people casting and catching harpoon size bluefin and saltwater gamefish using these little guys. Here is one of mine, a Penn Authority, 40 lbs drag, and it routinely catches 6 and 7 foot sharks that happen to eat our fish on the way to the boat. I figure they are a couple hundred pounds, and they are too heavy for me to bring into the boat to play with. I won't hesitate to pull in 4 foot sharks, even 5 footers, if it has one of my high dollar lures in its mouth, or I want to scare the passengers for fun.

I do have a collection of older saltwater tackle, and more than few reels that are "burned out" and the gears and stuff stripped of teeth and slagged up. It takes a few fish to burn out a saltwater reel, and I can't bring myself to throw them out.

SawyerTed · Reply #26 - Re: It's Snapper Time!

One thing that has made reels lighter and smaller is the crazy strength of a super small modern braid fishing line.

Reels had to be big to spool enough conventional mono line or old Dacron because the line had to be a large cross section to be strong. The amount of line needed to subdue a marlin, tuna, ornery wahoo or crazy mad king mackerel is 100s of yards. So the spools had to be big.

Now a braid can be 1/2 or less the cross section and many times stronger than monofilament line. Spools don't have to be large to have the needed capacity.

One thing about the smaller profiles with high drags is you better be sure of your rod holders and have lanyards on the outfits when trolling. A hard strike with an unsecured rod can mean $$$$ gone in a second.

We had a charter not long ago fishing the Gulf Stream from a 28' center console. The charter was with a captain I've know 30 years. Turned out he was sick. He had a young backup captain to take us. All was good.

We were trolling grass lines for mahi and had a good hit. The captain, (did I say young guy?) thought the fish wasn't hooked but I saw him with the bait coming toward the boat. Before I could say something the captain picked up the rod and started cranking. The fish realized he was hooked and ran. The captain not a small guy at 200 pounds and over 6 feet tall was jerked completely over the leaning post. It two of us to catch him, he was going overboard. High drag numbers will do that.