rod or reel

I was wondering people’s opinions on which is more important. If you are spending alot of money, do you spend more on the rod or the reel. I personally spend more on the rod. I agree with someone who once told me to spend more on the rod because all the reel does is bring the line back to the boat. The rod’s importance is more significant for many reasons, but mostly because of the difference in feel from the low end rods to the high end rods, and we all know important a sensitive rod is. It is also important to have quality reels, but if you are spending alot of money I think the rod is more important. Maybe this is an obvious question, I don’t know, but I have heard people say they will spend more on the reel than the rod.

labsrule

We could have gone more into that last night. I differ from a lot of my fishing partners in that I prefer smaller line capacity reels, rather than the larger spooled ones. (For Walleye and Bass) I change line a lot. I would rather change smaller amounts. Plus, the line 125 ft into a 250 foot spool never gets touched anyway. Smaller diameter spools make it easier for me to cast light jigs with ease. The smaller spool makes it easier for line to pass through the line guides at the bottom of the rod easier. The drag works “Easier” too when the spool is smaller. Rear drags are what I prefer most now. When hooking and fighting a large fish, it is nice to have that drag on the back of the reel. For this reason, I have gone back to Shimano for all of my spin cast applications. The 1000 and the 2000 classes. I prefer the Sedona and Symetre with the the dead bolt anti back reeling option. When jigging, this is a must have for positive hook ups. For night fishing, or slip bobber fishing, the anti reverse is a must for proper hook sets. They are also rather inexpensive, around $50 for the Sedona’s.

Rods, that is another story all together.

Tuck

When I first got into fishing I bought all the cheap stuff wondering why anyone would want to pay more…………then I started getting my hands on that stuff and quickly found myself wanting upgrades. Make no mistake, the cheap stuff catches fish and doesn’t hurt as much when something breaks but it really comes down to what you want as a person. I improved my reels first because I thought all rods were the same, essentially. Now that I’ve gotten my hands of hundreds of rods and reels, I find myself agreeing with Tuck on the Sedonas…………they’re a heck of reel for the price and the high buck spinning rigs aren’t THAT much better in many regards. I still shop a lot though! Once I got someone to put a REAL rod in my hands (a St. Croix!!) I started looking into those and now I find myself constantly shopping rods for strength and sensitivity, both casting and spinning. I now see my rod as the second most important ingredient……….line being #1. The rod can determine your presentation accuracy, sensitivity, and overall control of everything from casting to a specific style of fishing to the fight itself. For the best of all worlds no matter the species, I’ll fork over the dough for a quality rod anyday. However, I’ve found that there is still some pretty good “cheap stuff”!

I believe it’s mostly determined by an individual’s preference on which is most important and supplies that confidence. I know with muskies, I want a high quality reel!!! Rod sensitivity isn’t quite as crucial with pike or muskie as what it is important to have something that can handle that return!

Another fan of Sedona reels and St Croix rods. I tend to spend more money on the rods instead of the reels. The Sedonas (I own 4 of the 2000 series and 1 of the 4000 series)

have never let me down and they are around 50 bucks a piece. I’ve seen many guides with Sedona reels in their boats.

St Croix rods? ’nuff said. they are the best IMHO

I bought a new Guide Series reel from Gander Mountain this Spring. Make sure you get the one with the 10 ball bearings and the wooden handle. I paid around 80 bucks for that and seen other 10 ball bearing reels for well over 100 dollars. It has performed well on the one trip I took it on to Pool 4 with fireflick. We caught some nice fish that day.

I use St. Criox rod, and still use my shiman stimula a littl ebit, but the reel has always been shimano. I have never had them let me down other than the time one decided to jump out of my boat going down the road. I was so depressed that i had to go buy another one and even that didn’t cover it. I like the Shimano symetre reels. I have never had a shimano reel go bad on me and i have beet some of them up when i was younger by fishing by sandy beaches and getting all kinds of [censored] in them but they still keep going.

I’m a firm believer in spending a little more on the rod and less on the reel. Although the reels I buy must have a quality drag system. I prefer the Symetre’s from Shimano, but will also give great kudos the Mega lite from Finor(great drag). I’m personally not a daiwa or quantum fan. Nothing against them, I’ve had bad luck with them. The Pinnacle deadbolt is a good alternative if you don’t like the Shimano Sedona. About the same price, but you don’t get the backup spool either.

For a rod: If you need one rod to do multiple jobs for you the St. Croix Avid 6’8″ fast tip is one of the spinning rods made, again, opinion. You get a lifetime warranty by stepping up into the Avid series, plus you are buying one of the most sensitive rods made.

Love this stuff!!!

All of my trolling rods cost under $30 each. These rods all have reels at least twice that value. Can’t go wrong with a good line counter like a Diawa lcw27. I am pretty happy with the store brand “Galyans” glass rods in both 6 & 8 foot lengths.

I have a couple G-Loomis spinning rods that are serving me well. These rods cost over $200 each and have the $50 Sedona reels on them. I have other spinning set ups with mid range price tags, all with Shimano or Diawa reels.

So, trolling = cheap rods/expensive reels and Jigging/rigging = expensive rods/cheap reels!!

Jon J.

In playing a fish I think the reel is more important. A good drag will compensate for alot. A good rod may give you some advantage fighting a fish but the reel is the last line of defense. An example would your typical steelhead setup. A very long noodle rod to take up the fight of the fish and allow for the use of lighter lines, however the drag is still counted on in the end. Just my 2 cents.

well given that walleye dont fight like steelhead and mostly dont test the line TOO much I put my money into the rod every time.. although the Point Jon J makes is VERY true…. it depends on WHAT your doing.. trolling the reel is prime… jigging the Rod is prime…. casting.. well the reel gets used an awful lot and has to endure so maybe a balance is needed there….

Just a follow up to my first post…..

I will never spend $200 bucks on a rod again!! There are a lot of good affordable choices out there. The spinning rods I toss in the boat most often are a couple of rod/reel combos I bought on sale at Reeds. Two rods, two reels, $50 bucks!! I’m always looking for a deal and the best time to buy seems to be in the fall as the stores are switching over to ice fishing.

Also, when I’m trolling, most of the time I have boards out and the rods in holders. (open water, long linning cranks) No need for a sensative rod tip for me. If you hand hold your rod when trolling, a good graphite rod may be a better pick.

I always buy my rod/reels in pairs. A matching pair is great when fishing waters that allow multiple lines.

J.

I think it all depends what you are fishing and how you are going to go about catching those fish. For instance, walleyes– if you are going to be fishing a jig or rig your money is definitely better spent on the rod than the reel. But if you are trolling boards or downrigging, the reel is probably going to cost more than the rod.

I am a catfisherman and will say that I spend about 3X more on reels than I do on rods. I use Abu Garcia 6500 C-4 & C-5 reels that retail for about $80-100 but can find good rods for about $30.

So it all depends …….

Hi…

As some have said, I think it depends on the application. For jigging, I’ll pay a great deal of money so as to purchase a high quality rod with an awesome level of sensitivity. I have found it to make a world of difference. If I’m just going to fish for fun and don’t care how many fish I catch, then I wouldn’t pay the money because I know I can catch fish with a less sensitive rod, just not as many. If I really want to maximize my catching percentage by increasing my chances of feeling everything with the rod, then I pay for the high quality rods, like the G. Loomis jigging rods. I still pay for a decent reel, but nothing like the cost of the rods.

For trolling, I don’t feel I need the quality like I do for my jigging rods ($200ish). I’ll pay more for my reels (Daiwa SG27LC’s/ $90ish) than I will for my trolling rods ($70-80ish) because I really, really want a good line counter for trolling effectively.

For bottom bouncing and 3way rigging, I used to not care so much about my rods, but have found that I wanted to increase the sensitivity of them so I could use lighter weights. Hence, I upped the quality of those this year. Also upped the quality on the reels for them….after having been in a tournament with a reel that was not the best of quality but was decent, and lost fish because the reel wasn’t working properly.

For pitching, the quality of the rod I think I have equivalent to the quality of my 3way rigging/ bottom bouncing rods.

So, in summary…I guess I rank my rod quality highest to lowest being jigging, 3way rigging/bottom bouncing, pitching, trolling. And for reels…. trolling reels, then tie for the rest of the reels….

I’ve just been burned on the water before losing fish from poor reels, so if possible for serious fishing conditions,I try to keep them to a bit of a better quality. Although, boy that really hurts when you lose one over the side of the boat! But, that only happened when I was lindy rigging one time (so far)…when lindy rigging on rivers a lot of the time I’ll anchor and really work a current break or hole or something…and in that case I’ll let the rods rest on the sides of the boat..never putting them in a rod holder and never holding them. My catch rate is 100x better by doing that. But, I was doing this on the Wisconsin River one time, and wham! a sturgeon hit the thing and it was gone before I realized anything. Brand new rod and reel, first time out with it!!! Usually when doing that I can have the slightest tap and it can be a decent sized walleye (4-5 lbs where I was fishing), or a sturgeon (up to 60 inches on 6lb line or 8 lb line….what a thrill catching them)….! That is such a fun way to fish! Unbelievable you can get big fish hitting like that with such a slight tap of the rod!!! But, I never really invested much in reels or rods for that tactic, just didn’t need it….but did have to find the right rod that was strong enough yet sensitive enough at the tip.

Ok enough on rods….this discussion is enough to make one want to go shopping!

~Jenn

I guess not many catmen have responded to this. For the type of fishing that I do, a solid reel is much more important than a good rod. Besides, quantum big cat rods are as good as anything else on the market. Abu baitcasters are all I will ever buy from now on. They are the best. Rods vary quite a bit, but in catfishing situations, inexpensive rods are much easier to get by with than a cheap reel.

matt

my .02….until a year ago ive only had combos around $40.00…

a co worker preached the sesitivity issue with st croix rods, let me use one with a sedona reel on pool 4 late last year, needless to say i have 3 of them now and all on sedonas with various lines/colors. use my others when trolling. until a year ago i didnt understand the difference and impotance of sensitivity

I was getting ready to post, but all I have to say is read what jenn said, that is exactly what I was going to say. Well said jenn!ScottS