Advice on line weights needed

[rodvegas]

Have a lot of trout fly experience but am new to the salmon game. I have a 13ft daiwa whisker rod and a vision kona reel. The rod is rated 8-10#, the line I got is 9-11#. The guy in the shop seemed to know his onions and reckoned it wouldn't be a problem. Any thoughts?

[altmor]

Should be okay with that for up to medium sized rivers - the likes of the North / South Esks, Deveron, Earn or Awe.

It will depend on the head length of the line you have, if it's a floater or sinker etc, as this may influence the amount of retrieve before lift when making a cast.

The Daiwa rods, and the Whisker particularly should work well with being "loaded" to the max and with an average line weight for the rod of 9, and average line #10 you may just need to retrieve an extra yard or two, to find the optimum cast length.

For larger rivers, Tay, Tweed, Dee etc, and to take the cast from an average cast length of 25 - 30yrds (which your Daiwa set should achieve), up to 30 - 35 yrds, a longer rod would be required, say a 15ftr matched to a #10 line.

What river / s are you going to be fishing and at what time of the year ?

Altmor.

[rodvegas]

Thanks for that Altmor, I thought it would probably be ok, just wanted to check as I'm a total novice with salmon fly tactics and gear. I'll be fishing predominantly on the Don in Aberdeenshire, occasional days on the Findhorn, Ness etc. The odd day might be on the Dee, but my priority is to get comfortable and competent first before worrying about the "big" rivers! It's a short head floating line I've got. Have been advised that for the beats of the Don I fish that a floater will generally be ok teamed up with a sinking polyleader where necessary. It will be mainly late summer/back end fishing. Thanks again.

[rennie]

rodvegas,before you fish with your outfit put it all up on grass and put the line through the rod rings.Get the line where it starts to get thicker/thinner right in the tip ring and see where the colour change between belly and running line falls,failing that if its all one colour take a marker pen and put an unmistakable mark near the butt ring. When you cast try and get that colour change/mark in the same place every time.Now when/if you fish poly-tips pull in a little more line past your marker to count for the extra length of the poly-tip and away you go.Pedro.