Thread: Drag setting

With braid on my reels, I keep them fairly loose because of zero stretch. Also depends upon the rods I am using. I'm like you, I want a little pull off. Normally I hold the bait next to the reel/handle and adjust the drag to just start slipping. Even works for pulling crank baits.

I don't use braid so I have a little stretch in the line. Run my drag pretty tight.

Been missin ya on here blue thunder.

FB. I've been cruising and making a post every now and then. Made my first trip of the year last Friday to Claiborne and hurt the population a little. Lol. I'm gonna try to go back this Friday if the weather permits. Bout tired of chasing ducks and deer and start jerkin some lips.

Thanks for the input tracker. I'm gonna start re lining all my polls tomorrow if it's not too cold.

I don't use spiders to catch with , but do use a zebco spincast to swim a 3tail. I use mono and set the drag lite. I like to feel the tap and the fesh pull drag.HTH

I don't set my drag anymore unless I'm fishing during the spawn 3-4ft deep at Poverty or Grenada. And this is only bc of the occasional aggressive fish that hyper-extends your line before you can blink, surfaces and pulls off when spider rigging this shallow. I've just found that when fishing deeper than that the fish has started running with it 9 times out of 10 by the time you get to it to set the hook and they create enough slack on their own for a nice hook set. Several years ago I changed to spider rigging with 1 ball bearing baitcast reels and you can basically man handle anything that bites without having the thought of a good fish stripping the gears out on a hook set. Handles 2LB + fish nicely. I bring up this sort of reel because when setting the hook, I grab around the reel to do so. This puts my thumb near the line release button and in case I need it, I've already hooked up with the fish and can let my thumb give it as much line as it needs based on that situation. Has worked well for me. So I guess in my opinion there's no sweet spot in the drag settings because every fish is different.

When the depth that I'm fishing is less than half the length of my rod, I set a medium drag. That way if I don't have time to choke up on the rod, I can take my hand and pull out enough line to net the fish. This is whether I'm rigging or single poling. Anything past the length of my pole, channel at darbonne or caney or Claiborne, I set a tight drag because the hook is basically set once you notice a strike IMO. I kinda wanted to get some other opinions just to see if I have been doing it right. I'm really anxious to get back out on the water. My problem is that I've got too many other hobbies. Deer hunting, duck hunting, trail riding its hard to find the time to do them all and one always overlaps the other. Hunting season is pretty much over for me this year so the next couple weeks will be getting everything in order. Btw I've got a HB 570 DI in the for sale section if anyone is interested. I'd love to sell it local instead of dealing with shipping.

What good is a drag on a reel if you tighten it down. The object of the drag to to enable the fish to pull against the power of the pole but slip before the line reaches it's breaking point. I've fished with too many people that tighten down their drag and try to horse a fish in and end up breaking it off. Then they complain of always loosing the big ones. The purpose of the drag is to stop the breaking off. No matter what the fishing condition is, my drag is always set where I can pull line off the reel fairly easy. I've posted this before but here it goes again. Run the line through the guides and out the tip, tie a loop in the line and attach it to something solid like a fence post. With the rod horizontal and pointing to where it's tied ( the post ) walk backwards adjusting the drag to where it slips easily and way lower than the braking point of the line. Once you back off say 20 feet, lift the pole up 45 degrees and while holding it that way walk backwards again. You will notice how much more resistant the line is to pull from the reel. If you raise the pole vertical and continue walking you will see it's even harder to get the line to pull off the reel. The difference is the friction of the line on the rod eyes. Now by setting you drag with the pole nearly vertical to be near but below the breaking point of the line, you can basically set you drag on the fly so to speak by controlling the angle of your rod. Once the hook is set, you need to keep a bend in the rod or pole to keep the fish from spitting the hook. If the fish is big enough to pull drag, let him. If it is a very large fish smoking your drag, don't pick up your pole but rather point the tip at the fish. That will allow him to pull drag but not break the line.Once he tires himself out then lift your pole and reel him in, no need to horse him in. If you need a little more drag just lift your pole angle higher and you have more drag. All if this is especially true if you use light lines like 4 or 6 pound test. To those that use the stronger braids you will probably rip off his lips before you break your line. And speaking of braids which I have come to love, when first using them I broke 2 rods on hook set by having my drag set a little too tight. So with braid I like a softer tip section and a little less drag. This is just what I do, take it for what it's worth, 2 cents before inflation.
"gene"