opinion on fly reels for ice fishing?

[wicane07]

what do you think of the fly reels or similar to fly reels I am seeing?
I know its for stopping the lure from spinning, is it really worth it?

[pete/ny]

I have put most of my spinning reels into retirement after several years of converting over to flyreels.No more twisted coils of line, no more blindness and no more watching your jig get dizzy going in circles.They are really nice to use when not ( at least in my case) fishing over 15-20 ' of water.Anything deeper I will use a spinning rig.I have been getting my reels off EBay and they are tiny.Weigh 3 oz. 2 1/2 " in diameter. I also had a couple of the Black Betty reels and sold them.I still have a couple of the Eagle Claw inline reels which work really nice also.

[hobobob]

Try a control drop on a school of fish. You don't want to drop your jig down the middle of the school, ruin the feeding frenzy.  With fly reel, you can accurately control your jig's descent, slow or stop any where in the water column with pin point accuracy, picking off fishing one by one from top of the heap. A bit difficult to do with spinning reel.  When fish are on a finicky mood, you can easily move your jig up and down easily.  I use large arbor fly reel, so I get about 6.5 - 7 inches of line recovery rate. Not bad.

What's bad about fly reel, slow descent on deep water, you have to back reel or pull line by hand. About 1/2-1/3 as fast as spinning reel when reeling in fish. When line is starting to freeze, it's easy to backlash the reel. You'll have to take the spool off to clear it. Most often in the dark.

[wicane07]

so youre using just a fly reel, not one of the specifically designed fly reel type ice reels?
That was my question. also are you spooling up just mono or fluorocarbon?
I was thinking id just use my sinking line from my nymph rod with a 10 foot leader of 4lb ice line.

It sounds like there really are some advantages to this, because I really have noticed that spinning jigs dont get bit.

are there other ways to correct jig spin? swivels maybe?

[hobobob]

I put together my setups before most of these ice fishing fly reel came out.  I palm my reel and use a pencil grip on the rod, so I can't use many of those special design reels like the 621, black betty, etc.   I use only mono, fluorocarbon is a bit too stiff and unmanageable in the cold for my liking. I am not sure if you want to use your fly line for ice fishing. I would strip of the fly line, leave the backing, maybe put on more backing to enlarge the arbor for more line recovery.

As for swivels, you could try to use a micro swivel from fishusa.  I am not sure if that will cure the problem.  Another way to stop spinning temporarily is to have a limber rod, or better yet one with spring bobber. When you shake the jig continuously ( very small shakes ), the jig will stop spinning. Spring bobber will dampen the movement of the jig, but still able to stop the spinning. Remember once you stop shaking, the jig will start to spin.

Fly reel is not for everyone, some will love it and replace all their setups.  Some like my buddies will never able to get use to it.

[hobobob]

Another point I would like to add is stick to graphite reels. aluminum reel is cold. Really cold on bare hand.

[coboy]

In 20' of water or less I only use fly reels. If fishing deeper I'll use a bait caster. I use fly reel backing tied to some heavy mono then tie into 4 lb. fluorocarbon. Landing 4 to 5 lb. trout using the
drag on a spinning reel would cause a tremendous amount of line twist and the easiest thing to do was just cut it off. With a fly reel that is virtually eliminated. I don't use the drag, I just palm
it as the fish runs. I use Okuma reels that are aluminum but in a heated shanty a cold reel isn't an issue. There is no free fall with a fly reel, you have to pull out the line as the lure goes down
the hole as compared to opening up the bail and letting it drop with a spinning reel. With a 1 to 1 gear ratio the retrieve is much slower than a spinning reel. I recently lost a large pike that was
on for over twenty minutes partly because I couldn't reel in the slack fast enough as it made a run back toward the hole. Even after I lost it I only had a little line twist compared to using the drag
on a spinning reel and having to cut off about 30' of line to get rid of the twist.

[esox_magnum]

Fly reel for depths under 15' Multiplyer inlines for deeper depths, down to 1 spinning reel left in my rod bag of 7 combo's....

[wicane07]

most of the water I fish is less than 10 feet so I think i'll rig one up and try it this coming weekend. thanks for the info.
never really thought about the twist from fighting a fish before.