What rods and reels do I need to start with.

[Reel Overtime]

I am a walleye fisherman from erie, Boat is 26' and has autopilot, lawerance color hds8, garmin g.p.s., rod holders, down riggers, planer mast and big boards,  I have 8.5 med. rods with 15# mono, 20# braid, and also 18# 7 color lead on two.

Now the ? is what other rods and lines,?? (copper or wire) and how will i run these?

I want to start fishing salmon  so thanks for your help.

 Thanks.

[John Kelley]

I would switch the mono to 30 lb. to help combat the spiny water fleas, and to hold up to the big kings, and upgrade my leadcore to at least 30 lb. as well.  You can go lighter with your leaders if you choose.  Get some wire diver rod setups for pulling divers as well, and possibly a copper rig too.

[Don Supon]

Agree with John's advice on line weight. What you have is light for salmon strength and weight, but useable only if you have huge capacity and don't mind the fish having the upper hand in a battle. After spring season, the flies will stop you with that light line. The wire combos should be longer (than existing rigger rods) for clearance of riggers. Wire requires roller guides or a twille tip, regular guides will be grooved by wire. And you need some dipsey divers or equivalent to get away from the boat and down. Colors are infinite almost, but most prefer clear or black. Go with copper after you've learned these techniques; you could flatline down the chute or go off your big boards (many posts on how to do this). A lure speed and down temp system are extremely helpful, but expensive. Get it if you can, it will help the walleye pursuit also. Sounds like all you have to do mainly is change lines as you must already have the releases and such. Posts about these topics are frequent and numerous. Much has been posted already, usually in Tackle and Techniques. Go back for up to 2 years for opinions. 

[Yankee Troller]

Keep it simple! Run those 15lb rigger rods with spoons on your downriggers. I would add 2 wire diver set-ups to the mix and run your flasher/flies on those. 

 

I would only invest in copper if you A) plan on keeping fish for consumption B) are chartering C) are fishing tourneys. Longer coppers really take it's toll on fish, and it's no fun to reel them in on it. If I fun fished all the time I don't think I'd go over a 300 copper.

[FISHIN AGAIN?]

I pretty much agree with the other guys on the set ups, however with one change. Run the 15# mono with the spoons until early summer and then when fleas start getting bad,pull off some of the 15# and add 100 feet or so of 30# mono to combat the fleas. I run 30# Big Game then add a 10 foot leader of 20# floro. Good luck.

[Jolly II]

Take Yankee's advice on the copper, it's got a steep learning curve on how to run without costly tangles.  I'd set up 2 wire dipsies, they consistently produce fish, and are pretty simple to run.  I won't leave the dock without dipsies in the boat.

 

As for your 15lb mono...  It's fine for rigger fishing.  You'd be very surprised how much pressure you can put on big fish with quality mono, 12lb, 14lb, or in your case 15lb.  We do the exact same thing as Fishin Again does when the fleas show up.

 

And use the reel's drag.  I've seen some very catastrophic  failures with heavy line, and too much drag, trying to muscle a big fish. 

[Reel Overtime]

Thanks for the replys, We plan to fun fish the oak, no charter,or tourney, I have plans on adding a fish hawk speed&temp, we run double dippsys each side in erie and sounds like all i need there is to add two rod and reels with a wire lines? What rod and reel would be good for this? I do have two eagle med 10' rods that i can add reels with 20# or 30# line for riggers, Now what rod and reel will be good for the 300 copper? What reel would be a good choice for the rigger rod? I run mostly all okuma 30s.

thanks Rick

Edited February 23, 2013 by Prime Time 2

[Jolly II]

Those Okuma 30s are good, lots of guys on the lake have those reels. 

 

300 copper is a good length to start with, the longer coppers are tricky, and they are the ones that will cause problems more often than the shorter coppers.  I've got the Okuma Convectors, CV55L, for my copper reels.  Okuma also makes a pretty nice copper rod with stainless steel guides designed to specifically run copper.  I think I've seen them around for about $40. 

 

Your current dipsey rods will work fine also, except that you will want to replace the eye at the tip of the rod with a twilli tip, which helps to prevent the wire from kinking when it goes through the eye.  Your Okuma 30 size reels will have enough room for a 1000' of 30lb wire.

 

As Rick said above keep it simple, no need spend a fortune to completely retool your tackle, a lot of the gear you already have will work just fine, but with just a few changes.

[DJ 17]

Only thing I would add is put a full 1000' of wire on each dipsy set up.  That way you don't have to worry about backing connections/failures, plus you have plenty of line.  The Okuma 30's you have are the perfect size. I have 2 and plan on getting 2 more.  And the fleas can't grab the wire either