Serious salmon anglers know that the line you choose for your set up will be the difference between a highly successful day and the dreadful smell of the skunk.
Fluorocarbon line for salmon fishing is not the most widely used type of line, but it is the most successful.
Let???s look at some of the reasons why fluorocarbon line is a great choice for successful salmon fishing, where it is best used, and some of the reasons why it is not used more widely.
The Qualities
Fluorocarbon lines look a lot like monofilaments at first blush, but appearances are very deceiving in this case, especially if you are a salmon. Fluorocarbons have a light refraction index that is almost identical to that of water; in other words, they reflect sunlight to the same degree that water does, making them nearly invisible when they are being used for fishing.
Fish are going to be wary of a line they can see; everything has to be just right in order for them to take bait, so even when fishing for salmon in water that is not as clear as the ocean, such as rivers, it is still in the angler???s best interest to use a line that is hard to see.
Another advantage fluorocarbon line for salmon fishing has over its monofilament counterpart is its relative strength. Fluorocarbon line is made up of material that water cannot pass through; it is much stronger than line which is porous as far as water. This is particularly true in salt water environments, where water passing into the line will also mean hard tiny pieces of salt corroding the line from the inside.
Fluorocarbon line also has a distinct advantage over monofilament in that materials are often added that make this type of line much more resistant to abrasions. This comes in very handy when fishing for salmon along rocky riverbeds or near the bottom of the ocean, close in to shore.
The disadvantage and the best use of fluorocarbon line
You might be asking yourself, if fluorocarbon is so great as line, then why does monofilament line continue to do so much better as far as raw numbers? The answer is in the price. Fluorocarbon is more expensive than mono lines, and for most anglers line is not the area they want to spend a lot of money on, especially when even the highest quality require such frequent replacement.
One way to overcome this problem is to use fluorocarbon line as material for leaders only in your rig. This is the part of the line that the fish is going to come into contact with, so it makes sense to have it set up with the very best line there is. Using fluorocarbons for leaders and mono for the primary line can also account for the wide gap in the sales of the two lines, as by definition there is going to be a lot more primary line material sold.
Fluorocarbon line for salmon fishing makes the best leader material there is, without question. Its invisible qualities in clear water such as that found out on the ocean and its abrasive resistant qualities for fresh water in particular make it an ideal, if pricey, option for a successful day of angling. A fluorocarbon or copolymer line coupled with super lines for salmon fishing, provide the ultimate in success, durability and feel.
