Often when we talk about a particular rod or reel we seem to gravitate towards how far we can throw the bait. I know I am guilty but when you get right down to it so what. Today's better rods and reels will launch just about anything very long distances. Cast control has to come into play with this formula somewhere.
I agree it is very cool to bomb a cast a long distance but when you think about it a lot of the fish you catch are probably within a short distance of your boat or position on the bank. I guess an argument can be made that with a long cast you keep the lure in the strike zone a lot longer or do you. I guess that all depends upon your retrieve speed, rod position, lure type and of course the line you are using. Just how important is it to bomb a cast in most situations. Shorter casts equates to casts and therefore a better chance at the lurking prey.
I think it's according to what you are doing at the time, target cast or not, kinda like running a spinnerbait down a grass line, you would want the longest cast you can, but if your sending it to specific cover, just passed the cover works great.
I'm usually either throwing to the moon with a frog, roll casting a spinnerbug or vibrating jig or flipping and punching.
As a bank fisherman, extremely important. I've caught plenty of fish making long casts in several lakes I fish. If the fish are shallow it doesn't matter much. But when the fish are deeper and maybe on a ledge or out in isolated clumps of pads, yeah thumbs up for long casts. ~bb
There are long casts and super long casts. These type of casts definitely have their advantages in certain applications, for example when frogging. The challenge however is loading up the rod and driving those hooks in effectively when setting the hook. Not very easy to do when you have a bait that's over 40+ yards away. ~sweat ~sweat
Quote from: Bassinlou on November 28, 2017, 02:34:31 PM
There are long casts and super long casts. These type of casts definitely have their advantages in certain applications, for example when frogging. The challenge however is loading up the rod and driving those hooks in effectively when setting the hook. Not very easy to do when you have a bait that's over 40+ yards away. ~sweat ~sweat
You gotta hulk it! Put some back into it. My 65+ yard casts at TP with the frog have yielded several decent fish. Including a nice 6lber not long ago. Would never have caught that 6lber had I not practically unspooled my Tatula CT with 65lb braid.
Quote from: rickdelprado on November 28, 2017, 02:39:14 PM
You gotta hulk it! Put some back into it. My 65+ yard casts at TP with the frog have yielded several decent fish. Including a nice 6lber not long ago. Would never have caught that 6lber had I not practically unspooled my Tatula CT with 65lb braid.
Yeah... and hulking it comes with a price as you very well know. Anglers better know what they are doing when they set the hook from that distance or they will be wearing an ice pack that night... lol!!
Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk
Quote from: Bassinlou on November 28, 2017, 02:42:18 PM
Yeah... and hulking it comes with a price as you very well know. Anglers better know what they are doing when they set the hook from that distance or they will be wearing an ice pack that night... lol!!
Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk
Well I did hurt my wrist that day. Not sure if it was the hookset on that fish or before that when I wrapped line around my hand to hulk my frog out of sawgrass that's on the other side of the lake. That is the downside to super long casts.
:-/ the upside is I could reach the other side of the lake. lol
Quote from: rickdelprado on November 28, 2017, 02:46:57 PM
Well I did hurt my wrist that day. Not sure if it was the hookset on that fish or before that when I wrapped line around my hand to hulk my frog out of sawgrass that's on the other side of the lake. That is the downside to super long casts.
:-/ the upside is I could reach the other side of the lake. lol
These newer reels do a fantastic job launching certain baits when they are set just right.
Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk
Quote from: Bassinlou on November 28, 2017, 02:48:58 PM
These newer reels do a fantastic job launching certain baits when they are set just right.
Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk
I gotta tell you my CT can launch anything I want to throw. Of course it does have limitations. Obviously you can't cast a weightless finesse worm 100 yards. But normally I wouldn't throw a finesse bait that far. If I need to get out far I will put a 1/8 bullet weight on a worm or higher. Works real good.
Quote from: rickdelprado on November 28, 2017, 02:51:16 PM
If I need to get out far I will put a 1/8 bullet weight on a worm or higher. Works real good.
i only need to use a 1/16 wt. ~bb
~roflmao
Quote from: coldfront on November 28, 2017, 03:40:47 PM
i only need to use a 1/16 wt. ~bb
~roflmao
Oh I can launch a 1/16oz without issue, but if I want to unspool the reel its better with a 1/8 lol.
Quote from: rickdelprado on November 28, 2017, 03:43:54 PM
Oh I can launch a 1/16oz without issue, but if I want to unspool the reel its better with a 1/8 lol.
I know... I just don't take the easy way out. ~roflmao
(sorry Rick... ;D) just been a long day
this reminds me of those two guys peeing off a bridge
'sure is cold'
'yep, and deep too'
We preached (and were preached to) about keeping casts short back in the day. It's a philosophy that I still mostly adhere to.
So what is it- no-stretch braided line? What's made everyone into Olympic casters?
Quote from: D.W. Verts on November 28, 2017, 04:08:37 PM
We preached (and were preached to) about keeping castsshort back in the day. It's a philosophy that I still mostly adhere to.
So what is it- no-stretch braided line? What's made everyone into Olympic casters?
D.W. Verts, you are correct. 0 stretch from braided lines. Only way to set the hook effectively from a very far distance is by using braid imo.
Quote from: D.W. Verts on November 28, 2017, 04:08:37 PM
We preached (and were preached to) about keeping castsshort back in the day. It's a philosophy that I still mostly adhere to.
So what is it- no-stretch braided line? What's made everyone into Olympic casters?
Agree with Lou. The braid is the reason.
Hell, I can't even SEE as far as ya'll are castin'. Jeez.
I'm a long caster.
Now it's not always 40 yards.....but rarely under 20yds.
But I also do a lot of shorebusting.
But even in kayak, unless pitching or flipping or 'targetting'....I'm long casting.
Crazier thing......most of my backlashes only come when short casting.
AND if my 'designated' target is closer....I find myself moving farther away from target so it is a longer cast.
BUT the truth is....I'm not fishing tournies or competition and I LOVE THE BATTLE/FEEL OF BRINGING IN THE BASS!!!!!
I see folks just burn that Bass back, almost hydroplaning the fish back in.
I on the other hand....play that fish......I love to feel of the rod working it's magic!!! :)
When its open water I will cast long casts and play my fish out so to speak. But 20 yards or so is about as far as you want to cast in our pads. The stems on ours are more like stalks. Some as big as 5/8" thick and tough. You aren't cutting through 3 or even 2 of them with braid. Ours are monsters compared to what I see elsewhere. Snakes coil up on ours, birds rest on them, bait fish accidentally jump on them and cant get off. I've seen videos of the pads in other states they are like dainty little tender things.
You have a choice do you want your fish or just hook him and have about a 20% chance of boating him. They will twist you up so bad if you don't get that head up and bring them in fast. I have had to go to using a frog style hook on toads when they are heavy not only to get more hookups, but two hooks through the fish don't rip out as easy when you drag him through the pads and stems.
One advantage to long casts also is that when your partner is making a shit ton of noise in the boat and you have already gave up on trying to be quiet you can kind of get your element of surprise back being far away with your bait.
Like Lee said, depends on technique, flipping/pitching/punching no, you aren't going make a long cast but you want to max depth out of that Strike King 10XD crank, you'll want 65/75 yards. Running flats with topwater or spinnerbaits means a longer casts, very clear water means longer casts. Just depends on what you're doing.
Rodney
Quote from: rickdelprado on November 28, 2017, 02:31:02 PM
As a bank fisherman, extremely important. I've caught plenty of fish making long casts in several lakes I fish. If the fish are shallow it doesn't matter much. But when the fish are deeper and maybe on a ledge or out in isolated clumps of pads, yeah thumbs up for long casts. ~bb
YES! YES! YES! YES! What he said ^^^^^
One of the lakes I fish, you can WALK out a good 30 yards and only be hip deep. And if it weren't for gators, I'd probably do more wading. BUT SCREW THEM DAMN GATORS. I ain't gonna make it easy for 'em, kiss my pasty white hams, you never gonna catch me in water past my ankles around these parts. Furthest I've gone into water around here is when I lost my Zara Puppy to a stump. And I had a drawn pistol and was keeping a watchful eye, while Connie was on the bank with another gun, I think an AK if I recall correctly.
I only got knee deep, started sinking fast in the mud, and turned back.
If you're on the bank and the fish have gone deeper, sometimes the only way to get to 'em is by throwing something as far as possible. We don't always have access to deep water near the bank, so long casts are ABSOLUTELY a must have.
I'm with Dale Verts on the philosophy of short, accurate casts. However, I can pitch a bait about 45 ft. if necessary. I can do this because my reels have been supertuned. I do my the tuning of my reels but Mike Cork does it as part of his reel business. Supertuning makes a great difference in the smoothness and casting distanced of a reel. I'll let Mike Cork tell you the details as he is the person you are likely to send the reels to for supertuning.
Wizard
The longer distance a cast is the harder it is to detect a strike using underwater lures and get a good hook set with any lure. You want to make a cast that puts the lure where the active bass is at or where the lure can get down in front of those bass.
So let's discuse what a long cast is; any cast over 100' is a long cast, over 150' is beyond most bass anglers ability using standard bass rods and reels with lures under 3/4 oz weight under fishing conditions.
The situations or presentations that can demand longer casts are deep diving crank baits that require about 1/3rd of the casting distance to achieve maximum diving depths, stay down about 1/3rd of the cast then rise back up the balance of the casting distance. Deep divers require longer casts.
Active bass feeding at a distance where you need to make a long cast to reach them without spooking those bass. If you can get closer without shutting down the feeding activity, do that instead of making a very long cast.
Big swimbaits using 8' rods are often cast over 40 yards up to 60 yards in a effort to cover a lot of water.
Very clear highly pressured big bass lakes that I fish, during the day time, often require making longer cast than normally needed to present a lure without spooking those bass. My average casting distance is 120'/40 yards and sometimes up to 50 yard cast. I use very specialized highly tuned reels and rods to make long casts with 1/2 oz jigs and use mono/Copoly line, not braid because of the need for a leader that requires 2 knot that can and will fail.
My advice to repeate myself is make shorter cast if possible. Also know the casting distance by practicing on a football field with known yardage. Hula hoops make perfect targets to cast to.
Tom
Quote from: WRB on December 01, 2017, 12:48:36 PM
Very clear highly pressured big bass lakes that I fish, during the day time, often require making longer cast than normally needed to present a lure without spooking those bass. My average casting distance is 120'/40 yards and sometimes up to 50 yard cast. I use very specialized highly tuned reels and rods to make long casts with 1/2 oz jigs and use mono/Copoly line, not braid because of the need for a leader that requires 2 knot that can and will fail.
seems a pretty specialized approach.
the other side i've not seen discussed: more casts in a day puts lure in front of more fish.
increased odds of catching, catching more. catching bigger.
longer casts just mean more time running lure through more probable unproductive water/zones.
it's a trade off. good time to be intentional in choice, I think.
Obviously crank baits lend themselves to longer casts, especially the big extra-deep divers (I have about four boxes of DD-22's).
A jerkbait can also need longer casts...
Sometimes a topwater works better on a hail-mary throw.
But I am and always will be an old-school idiot- I got my spinnerbait savvy from Jimmy Houston and I emulate his extra-short underhand roll cast to targets that many times are just ten to fifteen away. When this kind of bite is happening, I make more casts than most.
Being that I'm not that great at this fishing stuff, I figure this increase my odds some.
Sometimes, like for a bank fisherman, you've just gotta fall back and punt. But let me tall ya'll something- how many times have you observed a fish make a pass at a bait, or follow it? I've had days in my life when that was a game-changer, telling me enough about what the fish were doing or what they wanted, or that they were even THERE, period. You're not gonna see that on an ultra-long cast as often.
I'm not trying to talk ya'll out of your long-distant, into the next zip code casting. It's just that the more I see has changed since I quit fishing, the more I kind like some of my junky old-school ways.
Interesting discussion.
Just wanted to share an old post of me and my buddies 'practicing' our casting. :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u89eAmdRdJM (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u89eAmdRdJM)
Nice thing is........the rods made Great Crappie rods........seeing we rarely brought a Bass all the way back into the boat...........dropping a crappie jig into laydowns helped to avoid a Lip Skunk Certificate! ;D
My days long casting are pretty much limited to deep diving crankbaits and other retrieve style lures. With most other things I believe the accurate casting, flippin and pitchin are better in a controllled area. Most long casts for me are along grass and stone lines to look for lurking fish.
I agree with those that said above. Not to say that I am right because I'm probably not. lol
And again, it all depends on what you're doing, is all the fish are being caught off ledges in 25 feet of water you're going to be at a slight disadvantage making 20 foot casts. By the same token, if all the fish are being caught in 5 feet of water by shore you're not going to be making 75 yard casts. I'm talking about big fish for a tournament. Sitting on Oneida throwing a spook you're going to be making long casts, the water is clear and the fish get spooky if they think a boat is there. There are times when you'll need to throw a bait like a jig jig worm , jig and tube etc a long way. it just depends on what the pea brained little critter is doing that day or hour.
Rodney
Quote from: Oldfart9999 on December 02, 2017, 11:06:52 AM
And again, it all depends on what you're doing, is all the fish are being caught off ledges in 25 feet of water you're going to be at a slight disadvantage making 20 foot casts. By the same token, if all the fish are being caught in 5 feet of water by shore you're not going to be making 75 yard casts. I'm talking about big fish for a tournament. Sitting on Oneida throwing a spook you're going to be making long casts, the water is clear and the fish get spooky if they think a boat is there. There are times when you'll need to throw a bait like a jig jig worm , jig and tube etc a long way. it just depends on what the pea brained little critter is doing that day or hour.
Rodney
spybait rodney...use the spybait!