Casting Call

A stiff south wind was whipping up lots of whitecaps the length of my favorite little coastal lake. The steady breeze put a nice bow in the slack of my line. This was perfect. As the trout gently took my bait, I could see the line moving toward the spot where I knew my sinker was resting. As the line straightened, I grabbed the rod, and as soon as I felt the weight of the fish, I slammed the hook home.

A foot-long trout headed skyward, starting a series of jumps that would have done a billfish proud. On my two-pound test and ultralight Loomis rod, I had all the fight I wanted. The rod bent double as the fish headed for a nearby dock. I applied a little pressure and brought him to the ancient pier where I and a couple of other anglers were enjoying the afternoon action.

Maneuvering my rod around the slats of our “fishing fence,” I slid the fat rainbow up on the deck, and dropped it into my ice chest, filling my five-fish limit in about half an hour. “Does that finish you up?” queried the quiet fellow fishing next to me. When I replied that it did indeed, he shook his head in frustration and folded up his deckchair. “I’ve been here for five hours and haven’t had a bite,” he said. “ I’m going to the store and buying a fish for dinner!”

I commiserated as best I could, but the poor fellow was the victim of “short cast disease.”

No Luck
When I arrived, I had badgered him for a few tips on the day’s fishing. His was a sad story. He’d been plying the water quite a while and had seen a lot of others catching fish but was having no luck. After I hooked my first couple of fish within about five minutes, I figured that most anyone could catch a fish and tried to give him a hand. I gave him some of my bait, checked his terminal gear, and watched to see where he was casting. The problem became very evident.

The waters of the shallow lake had a lot of vegetation and it was especially thick in the shallow flats near shore. My unfortunate fishing companion had a rod and reel combination that was only allowing him to cast out about 50 feet, while my casts were going out into the clearer waters twice as far from shore. The fish were cruising in schools out in weed-free water and his bait was literally mired in the muck.

Casting Challenge
There are times when casting a long way is more of a challenge than a fishing advantage. It always cracks me up when I see bank fishermen casting out as far as they can toward the center of a body of water, and those fishermen in boats on the same waterway are casting as far as they can to get close to shore! But there are occasions when you need to get into distant waters, to reach a certain run or get over an underwater ledge. What are some of the best ways to have that ability to get ‘waaaay’ out there?

Other than fishing skill, which can be acquired best through long, happy, practice sessions on your favorite waterway, there are four important elements to casting. These essentials are the rod, the line, the reel, and the weight you use.

The rod’s casting capabilities are in large part due to its length and flexibility. This last year I used a new rod designed for casting bobbers and was able to fire my gear all the way across my favorite river. Loomis made the rod extra long and provided a great whip action. My old 10-foot rod could cast a bobber some half way across the river, but with the new model, a foot-and-a-half longer, no fish in the river was safe! My companion on the lake getting skunked was using a rod a foot shorter and much stouter than mine. It was much better suited for fishing from a boat than for a fishery that involved casting for distance. Like I’m always telling my wife, “You need a lot of rods to be a good fisherman!”

Next you need good line. As a general rule, the lighter the line, the easier it is to cast. Also new, limp line is best. If you are using heavy or twisted line, it will cast very poorly and will often catch on your guides or reel, or may just tangle itself in a big ball. Your line, unlike some rods, is not made for a lifetime; change it often. This was the hapless fisherman’s biggest problem. The line he was casting for trout was really old stuff in the 20-pound range. The light sinker and bait he was using could hardly pull the line out of the reel, especially when propelled by his short heavy rod.

Reel Choices
The reel can make a big difference in casting. World-record casters use big, finely tuned level-wind reels. But for most of us, open-faced spinning reels cast easiest. A level-wind or bait-casting reel requires greater skill, since you have to put your thumb on the reel at the right time to ensure a smooth, backlash-free cast. A lot of bass-type reels have magnetic adjustments you can use to make casting easier, but they are still a bit tricky. On my day at the lake, the luckless angler had a perfectly functional spinning reel; it would have cast fine with some lighter, newer line.

Finally, the length of your cast is in part a function of the weight of the lure, bait and/or sinker you are casting. Besides skill, fly fishermen rely largely on the weight of the line to get distance. Bait fishermen need enough weight to help propel the line out to the desired honey hole. Having a few different sizes of sinkers is a great idea. It won’t help much if your line is really bad, but in most cases, a little extra weight “goes a long way.”

So how can you ensure that you will be able to get out to the best fishing spots? Use a long rod, fresh light line, enough weight, and a good reel and you are in business. And you can do what I do. Always have five different rods, half a dozen reels and a full tackle box tucked into the bed of your camper!

Bob Ellsberg’s column, Fishin’, appears monthly in RV Life and rvlife.com.