Albacore 2020: Lesson's Learned

[SilverFly]

Lessons content from the other thread is copied over. Feel free to add on.

 

[Jim Mcallister]

My lessons learned after 2 days on the water were this I had made my own rod. Allways being one to bend the rules, I took one of my sons 9.5 foot trolling rods that had a reasonably soft tip considering it was a broom handle at the bottom.I cut the bottom of the handle off 6 inches short of the reel seat. I mounted my reel with a t8 90 ft line with a t14 20 ft add on .Added a8 ft leader and attempted to cast it .hah what a bitch.With the weight of the fly on the long leader in front of the t14 I almost took my head off twice. Shortened the leader to 3 ft casted again and it went out to 30 to40 ft this will work.Thankfully the guides were small so I didn't have to change those but I knew I had to have a foregrip so I added that.I put a spay rod grip on the bottom for a fighting but also so it would fit into a rod holder for trolling.The rod worked great.When I stepped on to my friends boat they laughted alittle and said we might try it at the end of the day.We put 6rods out and started trolling ,after 1 hr I got board and let mine out, 10minutes later we hit a school my fish was the first to hook up.At the end of the day they had 6 and I had 4 .That was the first trip the second trip they weren't laughing and I got my own rod holder in the center of the back rail,now they fish my flies.This was 2019 since then I have learned of 2 rod companies that build 9ft 12>14 weight rods.I have learned that a shorter rod works better fore me as I can stand next to the rail when it comes time to net the fish ,hope this might help it worked well for me.

 

[Joepa]

Chumming for albacore can be a determent for fly presentations when fish are blitzing bait around the boat. I did an overnight trip last September on a friend's boat out of WP. We had some great bait stops on that trip - wide open bait fishing. But I had zero luck casting weighed flies and poppers while we had doubles and triples going in the back of the boat.

 

[Kfish]

I will need to obtain a 12wt and reel. What kind of fly line would you recommend?
Thank you in advance.

 

[Nick Clayton]

I will need to obtain a 12wt and reel. What kind of fly line would you recommend?
Thank you in advance.

Airflo Big Game Depth Finder, Rio Leviathan, Orvis Depth Charge, and the Rio Outbound with the T14 head are the 4 lines I recommend the most. Ive fished them all and been very happy with them.