Fishing pole/reel selection.

I am looking to buy a pole/reel, what are some of the setups you guys have and would recommend, I fish in the bay more than I do in lakes. Thanks Vince

Vince,

You'll probably want to be a bit more specific as to what you want to fish for...  You mention fishing bays more than lakes... does that mean halibut and stripers?  Any plans to fish in the ocean for salmon, rockfish or lingcod?  How much are you willing to spend?  Rod and reel combos can cost you anywhere between $40 Walmart specials to $800 for a high end reel and costum rod.

My general bay, light ocean rod/reel combo is a round baitcaster (Shimano Cardiff 300) on a medium/heavy fast 7-7.5 ft graphite rod (Shimano Clarus).   There are many on the board who really like Abu garcia reels, and you can sometimes find good deals on these.

Brian

Brian, to be more specific, I would like to fish for halibut, strippers, and salmon. Price wise, $800 is way too steep for me, if you dont mind me asking, how much is the setup you've mentioned.

Vince, if you use the search feature on the board, you'll find lots of discussions about the merits of different reels and different rods for specific applications. 

A good all-around rod for live bait and trolling halibut & stripers would be a 7 to 8 foot rod rated for line in the 15-25# category or there abouts.  Some good rods to check out would be the Calstar Graphiter 700XLH (7-foot composite rod) or some of the rods in the Seeker Blue Inshore II series (BCSW 708-7T or BCSW808-8T).  These will also be fine for light-tackle sturgeon and Rockfishing with jigs up to around 4 oz or so.

Shimano also has some nice rods as well that are quite affordable but I'm not as in tune with their product line. 

I personally like composite rods for general purpose bay fishing and rockfishing because they offer the durability of fiberglass in the tip section with the light weight and sensitivity of graphite in the butt section.

In my opinion, for your best chances at staying hooked up with a salmon, a longer and more moderate action rod is preferred.  You want a long shock absorber to keep the tension on the line with those barbless hooks.  For this reason, I really would place a salmon rod into a different category.  Long, moderate action fiberglass rods such as the Lamiglas CG90 DR or the Seeker SA853F or SA896 would be good choices for salmon mooching and trolling.

If you want a rod that will double well for bay stripers & halibut as well as salmon... a heavier HotShot style rod would be a good choice.   They work well for live bait drifting and even casting plugs and also work fine for salmon mooching and trolling with a deep diver.  They don't really have the right kind of action for rockfish jigging or sturgeon though.  G.Loomis HSR1025C is like what I'm referring to.   They are quite versitile rods.

Hope this helps.

Erik

I have the same set-up that Brain uses - IMO: The Shimano Clarus rods are hard to beat = quality + price  And since I fish with lighter line when salmon fishing, I can't say enough good things about the Culcutta reels - the drag is silky smooth - it's expensive but I feel that it's worth every penny AND it's something you can hand down to Jr. 

thanks a lot Erik, that was straight to the point and its just what I needed, now I know what to look for, Mooch, and Brian, I think one of the setups I have would be the same as yours, Ive held Mooches pole, and its got good action to it, I could tell its sensitive , but sturdy as well. thanks for all the info fellas, I appreciate it!

Vince...

Clarus rods are about $70
They come in many lengths and actions and all have a life time warrenty.

Shimano has many levels of round baitcasters that superficially look the same but differ in quality.  I had a Corvalus for 10 years and it worked fine, I now have a Cardiff and love it.  I don't quit have the money for the Calcutta, but I'm sure it's a dream to use.

Here are some approximate prices...
Corvalus ($60-80)
Cardiff ($100-140)
Calcutta ($180-300)
Calcutta TE ($350)