How to Save Line - How to Save Money

The more serious you become about fishing, the more you begin to notice just how much the things you thought were little can make a huge impact. One extremely small but crucial fishing necessity is fishing line. Whether you are casting fluorocarbon into some crystal clear water, throwing mono-filament with a big topwater tied to it, or using braid to reel in some giants from the weeds, fishing line plays a tremendous role in the success of a fisherman. I have always thought that you have to find the point in which the amount of money you spend on something matches the amount of quality that you will receive. Otherwise, you will be spending too much money on something with little advantage over something much cheaper. Fishing line is one area where it really helps to spend a little money on. It not only aids in having a better chance at catching a fish, but at also allowing your reel and lure to function properly. The problem is that fishing line can be very expensive. There is a solution though that can really help you save money while not sacrificing line quality at all.

When you go to your local fishing store, you will come across two different types of line. The kind that comes on a gigantic spool with hundreds of yards of line, and the kind that comes in a little box with 150-300 yards of line. For the most part, these huge spools of line will be much cheaper, especially when considering the cost per length. However, these large spools of line never have anywhere near as good quality as the small quantity line. It is also pretty hard to find anything other than mono-filament on the large spools as well. Of course, there are some exceptions but this generally means a large price tag. So what can you do? What I do is use the cheap mono-filament line as a filler for the expensive line on my spool. Unless you have a custom made spool, most of the line on your spool will never see the light of day as only the last 50-60 yards of line even have a chance of touching the water. The reason is because you can't cast many lures past 20-30 yards, and most fish that you catch aren't going to drag out tons of line either. You might say that you could cut off this 50-60 yards of line that is used and then use the fresh stuff below, but then the diameter of line filling your spool is much smaller and results in a much slower retrieval rate. This is where the cheap line comes into place.

Buy a large amount of 4-10 lb. mono-filament. It doesn't have to be expensive at all, really just whatever you can find. Next fill your spool to approximately 40% capacity. After this, use a double uni knot to tie the filler mono-filament to the actual line you wish to use on your reel. Click here to see how it is tied. By doing this, you will obviously save quite a bit of money and be able to replace your line more often without wasting any expensive high quality line.

I will say that it isn't quite as easy to fill your reel up with two types of line than in comparison to just filling the spool with one type of line. This is mainly due to the double uni knot, but once you figure it out it isn't that hard to tie. I have been using this method of a filler line for about a year now and have really saved quite a bit of money. The great thing about it is that you aren't compromising any characteristics of your good line, as the filler line just acts as a larger spool in many ways. Give it a shot and I can almost guarantee you'll be happy with the results.