uknewbie

I went out to my local lake again today. I am really getting the hang of baitcasting now. I didnt have a single backlash today. I changed the line to 0.14mm diameter 12lb and that helped me a lot to get better casting distance. I only caught a couple of small Perch on a small spinnerbait but it was more about practice. Disappointing thing about today is that the paint finish on my Cabela baitcasting reel is flaking off. The paint is falling off where i rest my thumb on the reel. Has anyone else had this problem?

I'll have to look into buzzbaits cos i dont know what they are. Pike are the main Predatory fish here in the UK. We also have Perch but the biggest perch i have ever caught is 3 lb 9 oz. By perch standards thats pretty much a fish of a lifetime. Its very rare to catch them over 3 lbs. the Pike here reach 40 lbs but a fish over 20 is considered a specimen fish. I got the baitcaster cos i tried this type of fishing on a recent holiday in Florida. I used a spinnerbait and i hooked a 9lb Bowfin. I was watching some of the Bass guys picking the fish up by their mouths. I did the same with the Bowfin. Ouch! it clamped down on my thumb. I wont be doing that again, no wonder they are sometimes called a dog fish. lol.

Thanks guys. That was very helpful. Being new to baitcasting i presumed that there wouldn't be much difference but obviously there is. Which lures would you recommend that have a decent casting weight yet stay quite close to the surface. Many of the lakes local to me hold lots of Pike but are quite shallow. Most of them dont go deeper than approx 8 feet. Lures that go too deep end up scraping the bottom and get covered in weed. Its a sure fire way to lose a lot of lures aswell.

I have just got a Shimano 6.6ft carbomax baitcasting rod and a Cabela ZX tournament baitcaster Lefty reel. All reels here in the UK are left hand wind. I have loaded the reel with 12 pound test 0.26mm diameter line. I am a complete newbie to this kind of fishing so please bear with me. Most fishing in the UK is for bottom feeders. We have quite a few Pike, Perch, and Zander. Thats about it for predatory species. Most reels here are what you refer to as spinning reels. That is what i am used to. I tried the setup yesterday on a local lake. After a few backlashes and a few birds nests i finally got used to the reel. However i am finding it difficult to cast the same distances that i could with a spinning reel. Is this normal? The lures i am using are spinnerbaits and weighted shads. Between 20 and 25 grammes. If i use one of my standard reels i can cast these lures much further. I did try to use a lure that only weighs 10 grammes. I can only get approx 20 feet distance with this lure. What sort of distances are you guys getting from say casting a Rapala minnow rap that only weighs just over 5 grammes? Am i using the wrong kind of lures for this setup?