The Avet Reel
After Islamorada, I went to the glades. This time, I used the Avet reel – the smallest one
available. And this, I have to say, was just so impressive. At a maximum, it can hold a 300-yard,
40-pound braid; talk about big (heavy duty) things coming in small packages!
Believe it or not, we were able to land 150-pound tarpons and even bigger bull sharks. Of
course it was nerve-racking but so far, I’ve had no issues with this one. We will be visiting
Islamorada again in a few weeks and I will be tortuting the Avet reel once more. I will post the
report for you all.
Tarpon Braid Experiment
I also tried out several tarpon braids. The standard no-stretch one works really well for casting
but those won’t work so well for tarpon.
What I often use for tarpon fishing is a circle hook with live baits. Do take note that these hooks
should have a bit of stretch in the line so that it can absorb the shock of the tarpon’s bite.
So what would happen if there is no stretch? Well, the circle hook could just bounce out of the
tarpon’s mouth. Also, instead of going to the jaw’s corner, it could go through a hard spot
which would make the fish spit it out.
But don’t worry if you are using those no-stretch braids; there are so many solutions to this
problem.
One of the things I do is to tie a 20 to 30-foot part of the 40 to 50-pound mono as the wind on
the leader. The mono will stretch, acting as the shock absorber between the fluorocarbon
leader and the braid. That long wind on the leader would prove to be advantageous too when
you are fighting a fish.
The second thing I do is using a stretchy braid for the main line. This product with Dacron
strands interlaced with different braided fibers just came out recently and it offers 10%
‘stretchability’. It is nearly as good as the mono.
The ones from Fins and Suffix have great hook-up ratios. Both hold up well when there is heavy
pressure from huge tarpons and even sharks. I have used the stretch braid offerings from both
Fins and Suffix with extremely good hook up ratios and both have held up very well to putting
heavy pressure on large tarpon and sharks.
I use those two solutions for my tarpon rigs, loading stretch braids measuring 300 yards plus
the 50-pound mono wind measuring 30 feet on the leader. To that, I attach the fluorocarbon
leader measuring about 60 to 80 pounds.
All those are fastened into the Avet reel which I love. This is such a powerful set-up, considering
it is small, allowing me a lot of capacity when I do long screaming runs.
I have also experimented with custom rods which blend fiberglass and carbon fiber. This is a
really great tool compared to the meat sticks a lot of us tarpon fishers have used primarily
because it’s lightweight.
What I do is find a forgiving live bait kind of tip which would reduce the shock for those hook
sets because this has the best lifting power when I’m handling a huge fish.
The California tuna fishermen are also making use of these set-ups nowadays, taking advantage
of the reels and braids which just came out recently. I will continue to try more of these
‘advancements’ and check out other people who are doing the same then post the feedback
here! Enjoy!
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