Time to take inventory of fishing gear

Published 8:24 pm Sunday, January 7, 2018

<p class="p1">This recent span of cold weather probably enabled a lot of sportsmen to do a review of fishing gear.</p><p class="p1">I did, and after hearing from Mike Soileau and Billy Turner, I should have done it a lot sooner.</p><p class="p1">Both, who will fish Lake Charles and down the channel to Prien Lake but only as far as Haymart turnaround, make sure they have at least one reel wrapped with light line, 6- or 8-pound test.</p><p class="p1">“Especially during the winter,” Soileau added.</p><p class="p1">“Regularly it’s 12- to 17-pound test,” he added, “but this time of the year the bait for trout is small shad so I go the smaller size line on a spinning reel. It’s almost like you’re crappie fishing.”</p><p class="p1">He said he will use 2-inch baits that he puts on a 1/16-ounce lead head.</p><p class="p1">“It works good when the water is really clear and the fish are not active,” he said, adding, “Just because you are using small stuff doesn’t mean you won’t catch big fish. I have caught up to 4-pound trout on this.”</p><p class="p1">The line he prefers is a Suffix Tritanium on his spinning reel that is attached to a long rod.</p><p class="p1">“What I like about the line is that it is a stretchable line, a line within a line and it doesn’t get nicked up as bad,” Soileau noted. </p><p class="p1">He said his favorite lures, and the one he has had the most success with for trout on the light line, is a small Bass Assassin, white with black flakes.</p><p class="p1">“Billy turned me on to this light line and it really works well,” Soileau said.</p><p class="p2">l</p><p class="p1">As for Turner, he’s a kayak fisherman and will launch at Prien Lake and spend most of his time right there.</p><p class="p1">“A few months back I started using only ultralight gear after reading an article online about some famous old salt guides in Florida that started using ultralight gear just to see what they might be able to land,” Turner said. “I figured that I might try it and since switching to ultralight gear I have not looked back.”</p><p class="p1">Most recently he hauled in a big drum.</p><p class="p1">“The gear used on this big drum was a 4-foot, 8-inch Ugly Stick ultralight spinning rod,” Turner said. “The reel was a very small ultralight Pfleuger President spinning reel with 6-pound test Stren original monofilament. Attached was a quarter-ounce jighead with a Gulp! swimming mullet lure.</p><p class="p1"><span class="s1">“It took some time to get this big drum to the kayak and it spooled me several times,” Turner said. “I cut my anchor loose and finally got the kayak to go to the fish a bit so I could get some line back on my spool. Once (the fish) at the kayak, I used a Boga gripper with scale.</span></p><p class="p1">“The scale stopped at about 40 pounds as this was all the fish I could lift without tipping my kayak over. Most of the fish was still in the water so I don’t know how much it actually weighed.”</p><p class="p1">He said several weeks earlier he had brought a redfish, about the same size as the drum, to the kayak on the same rod and reel combo.</p><p class="p1">“I made a foolish mistake,” he said, “and grabbed the line while trying to get my Boga gripper lips in its mouth. You cannot grab a light line that way as it will snap almost every time even on a fairly small fish. Using a net would be smart.”</p><p class="p2">l</p><p class="p1">Turner went on to say, “Now, during colder water season, it appears to me that the angler will get far more bites and land more fish on very thin line and lighter lures of whatever sort.</p><p class="p1">“Another advantage is the angler can simply snap the wrist a bit and the lure will sail out there. No fatigue even after casting constantly all day long. Although my wife and I only use kayaks to fish from, the same techniques work fine from a real boat or from shore.</p><p class="p1">“I am a big fan of the ultralight Ugly Stiks as no matter how big the fish you might hook, the rod will not break, unlike a graphite rod. The only issue is how much your small spinning reel can handle. Most small reels will hold about 90 yards of 6-pound test monofilament line, but this is more than sufficient for speckled trout. Hook a big redfish or drum and you have to be careful you don’t get spooled and the line snaps. But catching a really big fish on ultralight gear will put a smile on one’s face and astonish observers.”</p>