Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska What's your rod and reel combo for Salmon

Looking to upgrade from my generic ugly stick combo and figured I would see what you guys up north use

For everything except Kings, Shimano Calcutta 400 on a Lamiglas Rogue River 9'6" Med action rod. Spooled with 18# Maxima Ultragreen. I've caught kings on this combo too but I feel that the rod is a touch light for big fish in a current.

Shimano Calcutta or Penn 965 international on a lamiglass classic glass 8'2 or 9 foot for downrigging. Lately I've been using my Avet 2 speed on a loomis str 1265

I have my son and daughter using a Shimano Tekota on their Lamiglass custom glass rod

Shimano Calcutta/Abu Garcia Ambassadeur,Penn spinning for kings in the Gulkana ..for regular fish (pike to grayling) a proper size Shimano Sedona OR better ! > with the rite line! Ugly sticks abound in my boats ! Blue box Trilene or bust for ! never caught over a 37 pound king . but my 49"+ 28lb pike is my high mark to date (top water muskie lure took him)!

As a rule I despise UglySticks. I know they're tough, but they are heavy and I like a little more backbone.

All that said I caught my biggest King, a 71lb buck, on an 8'6" UglyStick with an old Penn spinning reel from the 70s that sounded like it had a handful of gravel inside it!

Don't forget to get yourself a good side drift rod with a Shimano spinning reel full of 8# line to bounce beads for trout and dollies. I use a 10' Shimano Scimitar with a 2500 Sedona. Trout on the Kenai while the salmon are running are more fun than the salmon to me.

Are you fishing a river? from shore? from a boat? salt water? makes big difference in gear needed. I use different rods when fishing from shore or fishing from a boat. Depends also on whether it is a small swift river or wide open salt water. Have caught kings on trout gear in saltwater and used 100 lb. line when shore fishing a whitewater river overhung with brush-- and broke line! Didn't break the 8 lb. (or 6?) line in salt water where we could follow the salmon in a boat.

That said, my rig for reds in a river is a 10'6" Skylitz 1062M rod from Tillamook Sporting goods, with an Ambassadeur 6501C4 filled with 40 lb. fine diameter synthetic braid and 14-17 lb. leader. I use leader that heavy because incidental hook-up of kings is common. For back-up I have a 9'6" medium spin rig.

For jigging salt water and fishing smaller rivers from shore for kings I have a 9 foot Berkley A92-9XH rated to 50 lb. line and up to 3 oz. lures. Daiwa Sealine reel with 50 lb. braid and whatever leader seems appropriate. Have mostly used 15-20 lb. leader in salt water for big kings, 25 when fishing a river from a boat, to allow a b it of margin for abrasion. 40 lb. leader for kings from shore in rivers big enough for room to play and follow the fish on shore.

Kayak fishing for salmon of any kind I use shorter rods, 7 footers whether spin or bait casting.

Thanks for the input I probably should have specified river fishing wading a mid size to small river

I am strictly a river fisher. My rod -for many years now- is a medium action 7' Ugly Stick with a Penn spinner on it. I don't like too stiff a rod, nor too long (though I have -had- one that way that saw almost no use.)

Oregon ...

Salmon ... I've switched to 30 pound super-braid line instead of mono. It's enough smaller diameter that I get by fine with an Ambassador 5000 series reel. Most of my salmon fishing is trolling from a boat and the way we set up, an 8-1/2 foot rod is minimum ... kinda use 'em like an outrigger. Any shorter, we tangle lines. I'm using an old Kunnan North River medium-heavy 8-1/2 foot rod.

I used the same rod, but with a high-speed retrieve version of the same reel loaded with 12 lb mono for a long time for steelhead. I've upgraded (?) to a 10 foot rod .. a little more sensitive. I do more bait fishing bouncing eggs. The extra length lets me do a less violent cast which means losing less bait casting. A little softer rod tip gives me better feel.

Ironically, I'm thinking about swapping to an Ugly Stick for salmon because I don't need a sensitive rod to troll with, any old (tough) plank of a rod will do.

Tom

I like a Ambassador 6600 series reels with a 8 1/2 foot medium heavy action rod with a fast rod tip for river fishing. We are fishing for silvers.

I just upgraded my trolling gear this summer. I picked up six Fetha Styx dowrigger rods and Shimano Tekota reels with line counters. The line counters make it really easy to get some consistency when trolling divers or sinkers. They also work well for hitting suspended black rockfish schools and keeping the jigs out of the non-pelagic species on the bottom.

For bank fishing, I still use my 15+ year old G. Loomis GL3, HSR1021 and a Abu 6500 C3. I have a couple of HSR1023's, as well, when I want a little more backbone for kings.

The HSR's are one of my favorites. Great rods

Bang for your buck, it's Berkely Air with a Shimano Tekota LC reel. Been using that combo for years on 70+ charters a year. Several other top lodges have switched to them too as Loomis's warrantee went to crap. Not as flashy as the bigger brands, but I could show you a mountain of kings/coho/halibut that get landed on them.

Oh please don't make me choose only one, its worse than asking to pick only one rifle.

G Loomis Salmon Spinning SAR1084S 9 ft Moderate Action rod, extremely tough but very sensitive which was the key in catching the non biting Kings in Valley streams in the Willow/Caswell area, the secret was keeping a tight line when drifting, strategically adding #2 split shot sinkers to a 3 ft leader to place the line directly in their face in whatever depth the Kings were in to line them in the mouth and as they turned their head ya set the hook ..... Without an ultra sensitive rod you could not feel the difference between a bump off the bottom or a fish trying to spit your line out , this method accounted for 100's of catch and release Kings per weekend .......

Penn 650ss spinning reel loaded with 80# test Pro Line as a backer and 40# test Berkley Big Game green line as a leader , With this I dominated Willow Crk, Sheep Crk and Montana Crk in the MatSu valley for years before they screwed us with the closures ........ Won the King Derby a few times including the first PRO CLASS Derby taking 1st and 3rd

I use the same set up for red & silver salmon in Kenai River, silver salmon in Seward and Valdez.



https://caprasoutdoors.com/fishing/...salmon-series-rod-spinning-sar1084s.html



http://berinsontackle.com/products-page/1-reels/penn-spinfisher-650ss-spinning-reel/

I use gillnet. It's much more efficient.