I made a 10.5 ft drift rod from a fly rod blank with a spinning reel seat. It worked OUTSTANDING for steelhead this year but I plan on fishing the reds in Soldotna this year. Anyone have any good results with braided or fusion lines on a spinning reel?

I would be careful with the braided fishing for reds. If you do the flip and strip that most red fisherman do you will likely have the line tangled in the reel. I also think you will have problems with the braide doing wraps aroung your fingers and those reds will put a big hurt on you. I would suggest tapeing on a fly reel to your new rod.... Much easier to control. You only are fishing with about 20-30 feet of line and never need to reel in so the reel in the back of reel seat works the best. I use mono on a fly reel and it works pretty good but I think fly line works good too. You do snag some sometimes and when you do they really rip off the line so if you have the braided around anything.......lookout!!!!

Hey Kriz,

I'm not a big fan of braided lines but I think the one area they shine over mono is on a spinning reel for float and jig fishing. The line floats, and when you cast WAY upriver and let it go WAY downriver like I do, you can mend and tend the line so you get a drag free drift.

I use the Power Pro stuff and don't use any special knots, just an improved clincher going twice through the swivel intially. You also never lose floats when you use a mono leader, as you must do. The extra give of the long, soft rod with the mono leader is enough shock absorber on most fish.

I also made my "float rod" from a fly blank; a Sage 9.5' 8 weight RPL. If you use a stiff rod with braided line you'll rip lips or bend hooks, right Jigman? Small, crappie-type jig hooks will probably bend for sure on a decent fish. Use a good thick wire hook with this setup, you hate to lose those big ones. A good quality spin reel (Shimano) with a good drag system is also a must. Put 8-10# mono on the spare spool and you can fish a lot of different water a lot of different ways.

Having said all that, I put that rod in dry storage come March. I don't think it's a good big fish rod or high water flow rod. I get smoked on my medium-heavy stuff during this time period. Accidental chum hook-ups with this rod take forever to get in with any current. I don't take it to the Peninsula when I get the chance to go. I also think the floating line might spook summer fish, I didn't do as good as other float fisherman with clear mono.

I hope that helped.

Hey Todd, see any turkey's?