Pick Your Line by the Water, Not the Fish

Quick answer: Use mono for general fishing, topwater and kids' rods. Use fluorocarbon when the water's clear and the fish are wary. Use braid when there's cover to rip fish out of, or when you need distance and feel. Add a leader with teeth in the water. Then set your drag to about a third of the line's rating.

Most people pick line the way they pick a sandwich, by looking at the biggest thing on the label. Ten-pound test, fifteen-pound test. They figure the bigger the fish, the bigger the number.

That's backward. A twenty-pound catfish in open water can be landed on line a lot lighter than you'd guess. A two-pound bass in a flooded brush pile can snap you off in a second. The fish matters less than what's around it.

Ask three questions before you look at a single spool

What's the fish going to run into? Weeds, timber, rocks, a dock piling, a zebra-mussel-covered bridge footing. Line that's tough enough for the cover is the first decision. Everything else comes second.

How clear is the water? In stained or muddy water, fish don't see your line, so use whatever's strongest and cheapest. In gin-clear water, they do see it, and you'll want something nearly invisible.

How does your lure move? A floating topwater plug wants line that sits on the surface. A deep crankbait wants line that sinks. A jig you feel with your fingertips wants line that doesn't stretch.

Answer those and you've already narrowed it to one type.

Monofilament: the one that forgives you

Mono stretches. That's the complaint and the gift. The give absorbs a headshake, keeps hooks from tearing out, and covers for a drag that's a little off. It ties easily, holds knots well, and it's the cheapest of the three.

It floats a bit and sinks slowly, which suits topwater plugs, spinners and bobber rigs. Stretch costs you sensitivity on a long cast, and it picks up memory, those coils that come off the spool like a phone cord. Warm line holds the coils worse, so don't leave a rod in a hot truck bed.

Mono is also the right answer for a kid's rod. If you're putting your boy or girl on bluegill, it's the line that makes the least trouble. There's more on that setup in Take a Kid Bluegill Fishing and Be Home in Ninety Minutes.

Fluorocarbon: the one the fish can't see

Fluorocarbon sinks, barely stretches and is harder to see in the water than mono. It's also tougher against abrasion, which is why guys use it for leaders even when the main line is something else.

The downsides are real. It's stiffer, so it tangles on light spinning gear more than you'd like. Knots need wetting and a slow, snug pull, or they'll slip. And it costs more per spool.

I'd spend the money in clear water for finicky fish: bass on a drop-shot, trout in a low gin-clear stream, walleye on a bright day. In muddy water it's money you didn't need to spend.

Braid: the one that doesn't quit

Braid has almost no stretch, and for its strength it's thin. A thirty-pound braid has roughly the diameter of eight- or ten-pound mono, so you fit more line on the reel and cast farther. Fish bite and you feel it. You set the hook and it goes in.

Braid is what you want for frogs over matted vegetation, for heavy cover where you need to pull a bass out before it wraps you up, and for deep water where mono's stretch would swallow your hookset.

Concede the trade-offs. It's highly visible, so in clear water tie a fluorocarbon leader of a few feet. It cuts into your fingers if you wrap it around your hand, so don't. It slides on a bare spool, so put a wrap of tape or a few turns of mono underneath. And it needs a Palomar or a similar proven knot, because plain clinch knots slip.

Braid also doesn't forgive a bad drag. If it won't stretch, something else has to, and that something is your rod, your knot or the fish's mouth.

A starting point by fish

These are common starting ranges, not laws. Adjust for your cover and your water.

• Bluegill and other panfish: 4 to 6 pound mono. Go lighter in clear water.
• Crappie: 4 to 8 pound mono or fluorocarbon.
• Trout: 4 to 6 pound mono or fluorocarbon. Go finer on small, clear streams.
• Walleye: 6 to 10 pound mono or fluorocarbon, or light braid with a fluoro leader.
• Largemouth bass, open water: 10 to 15 pound fluorocarbon or mono.
• Largemouth bass, heavy cover: 30 to 50 pound braid.
• Catfish: 15 to 30 pound mono or braid. Bigger blues and flatheads in current may need more. The night setups in Night Catfishing Without Wasting the Whole Night lean on this.
• Pike and muskie: heavy braid or mono, plus a steel or thick fluorocarbon leader. Their teeth cut regular line like scissors.

Set the drag, or the number doesn't matter

The rating on the spool is the line's breaking strength under ideal test conditions. Knots weaken it. Nicks weaken it. Old line weakens it. That ten-pound test might be seven and a half by the time it's tied to a hook.

So set your drag to roughly a third of the rating. For ten-pound line, that's three to three and a half pounds of pull. A cheap hanging scale does the job if you want to check. Otherwise, pull line off by hand and make sure it gives smoothly before the rod bends hard.

Lighter line with a correct drag usually beats heavier line with a drag cranked down. It also shortens the fight, which matters if you plan to let the fish go. Dragging a fish around for ten minutes on gear that's too light doesn't help it live. The release basics are in How to Release a Fish So It Actually Lives.

Replace it before it fails

Line wears. Mono and fluorocarbon go stiff and weak from sunlight, heat and use. Braid fades but lasts longer. Run your fingers along the first twenty feet. If it feels rough, fuzzy or flat in spots, cut it back or respool.

Respool at the start of the season for the rods you fish most. It's cheap insurance against losing the fish you waited all year for.

Pick up what you drop

Old line is a hazard. Birds, turtles and other wildlife get tangled in it, and it lasts for years. Don't leave it on the bank or in the water. Cut it into short pieces and put it in the trash, or use a recycling bin at the ramp or the tackle shop if there's one. Leave the spot cleaner than you found it. Somebody's kid will fish there next week.

One last note. Line choices, leader rules, and even what you're allowed to fish with vary by state, province and water body. Some waters have gear restrictions, and plenty have rules on what you can keep. Check your wildlife agency's current regulations before you go. Size Limits, Slot Limits and the Rules That Keep Fish Coming covers how to read them.

Buy one spool for the water you fish most. Learn it. A season on one good line beats a tackle box full of guesses.