Long leader or Short leader ??? Landbased/Surf fishing.
OK. Im just after peoples opinions and reasons for long or short leaders. For landbased / surf fishing, chucking lures etc. Generally using 9ft to 12ft graphite rods. I normally find people on this site love to discuss different rigs etc.
Whenever I use a long leader (longer than the rod and wrapped a few times around reel), I get people saying “you don’t need to do that, just use a 1m leader, it works fine, no leader knot through guides etc etc”.
But then whenever I rock up at the beach with a short leader (bimini in braid, GT or improved Albright knot to 1m of mono), I get people saying “oh, you really need a nice long leader to reduce shock to the leader knot and protect from reef etc”.
I guess I should just do whatever I want, but I am interested in your opinions and preferences.
I usually have a long enough leader to wrap a few times around the reel. Generally 14lb or 20lb braid mainline with a 3 - 4m long 20 - 60lb mono or fluoro leader. Depending on what I am fishing for.
I used to do a bimini twist to GT knot or Albright (improved) but find the bimini often gets snagged on the bottom guide so I have moved to a PR knot (Chinese finger trap style) and it seems to work well.
So…… what do you use. Long leader for bait, short leader for popper chucking? Long for both? Short for both?
Pembo
Sharktale
Posts: 88
Date Joined: 13/07/11
Pandora's box!Couple of
Pandora's box!
Couple of thoughts:
If on reef I use a high abrasion 9m leader. Saves the braid a bit. No reef with and casting lures/drift bait I go for short leader 1.5m fluoro. Try the mid knot - have used this on 15lb Nitlon and 25lb leader and loved it. Also try back 2 back uni but experiment with amount of wraps - the thinner dia the more the wraps.
"I FISH, 'CAUSE THE VOICES TELLS ME TO...."
snapper
Posts: 335
Date Joined: 09/02/08
I use
Varivas Tapered Shock Leaders , they are 32' long and taper fron 18 lb to 70 lb at the business end. The knot ends up being quite small and passes through the rod eyes easily.If you are wanting to get any distance with your casts the general rule is
10lbs of leader for every oz of sinker eg 4oz sinker - 4olb leader . If you try casting far with a short leader you run the risk of it snapping off and maybe hitting someone.
Assassin Land Based Fishing Club Member
MattMiller
Posts: 4171
Date Joined: 15/06/09
To be honest
if you can be bothered tying a PR knot you should sick with the longer leader. You can put more grunt into your casts and have far superior abrasion resistance to any 1m leader.
Only thing I would advise is to keep the leader as light as practical. Thinner leader, longer casts.