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Posts: 20188
Location: oswego, il | In the early 90's a 7' rod was pretty good. 12 years later the 8' rod craze. It didn't take long before the 9 and now some 10' rods are out there. I suppose this time stamps you but what was the first rod and reel you bought? Mine was a 6'10" Falcon MH Musky rod with a silver Garcia 6600 that had the extra wide cumbersome palming plate which was on sale. |
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Location: Eastern Ontario | 5.5 foot Fenwick pool cue with Abu 6500 36 pound Musky Master dacron line piano wire leader with that and my Suick I was a weapon. Most will think the rod too short by todays standards but I was standing in the bottom of a tin boat. I still use a shorter stiffer rod for jerk baits than most.
Edited by horsehunter 3/3/2021 5:04 PM
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Posts: 23
| 8' St. Croix mojo musky heavy and Shimano Calcutta 400D. Still have it and use it as a loaner. |
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Posts: 747
| 1984.... Berkely Cherrywood 5'6 paired with a 7000 Abu.... |
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Posts: 51
| 1982 5'10" "multi purpose" Fiberglass Ogata Thorne (pre Thorne Bros) with a
Bantum 500 Stainlesss (also had a ABU 6500). Used the standard (then) 36lb Dacron.
Spliced instead of tying knots as Dacron had poor knot strength, pain in the butt and twice a day + ! Be nice if that blank was still available though (for us old guys).
A buddy started a bit later with a Thorne Brute, butt half glass front half graphite in about same length but with ABU 7000 and yup 36# Dacron.
Times have really changed.
But back then a 50" fish was a rare thing, and waters were pretty much limited to the Longville area and the Mississippi river, natural fish. What little planting done in Minnesota was shoepacks and a 40" shoepack was a one!
Thanks to Muskies Inc................And catch and realease...............!!!
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Posts: 51
| Yes, forgot, the Cherrywood was the back up with a 6500!
The good old days. |
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Posts: 194
| Circa 1974 and state of the art at the time Skyline Graphite rod 6' with Abu-Gracia 5000 (red) customized with set of buzz gears purchased at Easterlings. I still have the rod and reel but I did burn out the buzz gears and had it rebuilt around 1985. Wish I knew how to figure 8 back then. |
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Posts: 32830
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | I fished muskies with jigs back then, 7' Medium-heavy action 1967 or so Skakespeare spinning rod and a Mitchell 301. |
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| In the middle 60's, while in high school, bought a 5'6" rod from a little shop in Wisconsin Rapids. The guy made them in the shop. Solid glass, tip was much stiffer than average casting rod of the time but it was strong, not stiff. He fished muskies and it was something he came up with that could handle the lures of the time and still fight a big fish. Never caught any big muskies on it, but caught many big carp from 15 to 40 pounds. |
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Posts: 20188
Location: oswego, il | Funny how low profile is the reel of choice now in musky fishing. They are nothing new. How many remember the bantam and the quantum reel from the 90's that a few musky celebs used on tv. No instant anti reverse! |
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Posts: 34
| a 5'6" Browning Silex that you couldn't bend to save your life and a 5500. I still have the Rod, but the reel is long gone. |
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Posts: 103
Location: Miller time Wisconsin. | This is my 3rd attempt at posting, the previous 2 took a long time to type, then turned into cyberdust before I could submit. Here is my last attempt, condensed.
Last century, pre internet, book reading only, trying to learn about musky fishing.. On the way to my first ever musky fishing trip I stopped at Rollie and Hellens. They hooked me up with an Abu Garcia on a St Croix rod with something braided. Within an hour of buying the rod/reel, I caught my first musky on big lake in Vilas County Wis, a 37 incher on a purple Mepps bucktail that I bought at a garage sale.
This was my first ever try at musky fishing, in a tiny 12 ft boat with a 6 hp Johnson tiller, and no electronics, on a new lake that I had been on for maybe 20 minutes. |
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Posts: 2289
Location: Chisholm, MN | 5 foot something Eagle Claw. One of those yellow ones pair with some old abu. |
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Posts: 394
Location: WI | 5'6" St Croix model 15BC-56XH-SH with an Ambassadeur 5000B. 27lb Dacron line was replaced after a couple years with the "new" 36lb Musky Mono.
Edited by Emptynet 3/3/2021 8:40 PM
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Posts: 1222
Location: E. Tenn | Caught my first 40"+ in '82 on a Fenwick 5'6" graphite rod, matched with the original Daiwa "Magforce" reel. the rod was the princely sum of $29.95, and same for the reel.. Oddly I still have both.
My first musky rod was a St. Croix "Triumph" 7' MH, purchased 20 years ago, and still serves as a dedicated Suick rod. (don't judge me)
Edited by miket55 3/3/2021 9:58 PM
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Posts: 939
| 1984 -South Bend 6' and a 5500 Abu spooled with 36# Dacron
Jeff Hanson
madisonmuskyguide.com |
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Posts: 742
| In 1980, 5'09" Skyline graphite rod with an Abu 6500ca, the first year with the palming side plate, and it came with the high speed retrieve, a 4.7 to1 gear ratio. And the staple back then, Cortland musky master, 36lb black dacron line. Horse hunter, your not alone. I also use the shorter rods for jerk baits, with the 6'09" being my favorite. Kdawg |
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Posts: 304
Location: Lino Lakes, MN | I had several early rods. My first rod was a Shakespeare Series One muskie rod. 6'3" paired with a Abu 6500C -Dacron line 36# and wire leader. It had the perfect tip for working 6" Reef Hawgs.
I got married in April of 1990 and I took some cash and splurged on a Thorne Bros 6' fiberglass jerk bait rod and paired that with a 6500C. My how equipment has changed over the years.
I used to be the young kid in the room at the Twin Cities Muskies Inc. Meetings- now I am one of the "older" guy's in the room. Names like Smokey Swenson, George Whall, Frank Schneider -just to name a few guy's who were in the rooms back in the late 80's at Little Jacks in NE MPLS. |
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Posts: 1209
| 8.5' XH st croix mojo muskie and a NaCL 50 in 5.4 gear. |
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Posts: 1217
Location: Walker, MN | Early 90's a 6' Fenwick and old Bantam reel, 27# dacron. Mid 90's those grey Gander Mountain rods with 6500 Abus and dacron line. Before that it was thrown together heavy bass combos with 20# mono. |
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Posts: 13
| St. Croix 6'6" MH and Fenwick 6' HMG jerkbait rod, Abu Garcia 6500 reels. I still have them.  |
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Posts: 157
Location: Alexandria, MN | 7' medium-heavy St. Croix rod with an Ambassador 6500 reel spooled with 36 lb Dacron. Early '90s. |
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Posts: 267
| Cabelas Fish Eagle blank, 6' 2" with a silver 5500. Made it myself. Then I bought the 7' 6" blank and made that one and put a 6500 on that one. |
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Posts: 1262
Location: Stevens Point, Wi. | 5 foot Husky Cisco Kid glass rod paired with a Pflueger Supreme. Still have the combo hanging on the wall. Guess I've been 'stamped'. |
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Posts: 455
| 7' MH Tony Rizzo rod and a 6500 abu
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Posts: 1760
Location: new richmond, wi. & isle, mn | 1979- Eagle Claw blue diamond rod with a Pflueger supreme. |
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Posts: 103
Location: ITALY | Year 2004 my first casting Rod st.croix PM 610mf, reel Abu Garcia 5601c3 hss limited |
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Posts: 1937
Location: Black Creek, WI | 5'6" Ugly Stick with Bantam 50 reel. Then, in 1987 my Dad gave me a custom made 5'6" St. Croix loaded with a Garcia 6500. The good 'ol days. |
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Posts: 253
Location: On the water | South Bend Tony Rizzo Signature Model 6' and a 5500 Abu spooled with 36# Dacron that I still have. |
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Posts: 343
| Bought my first muskie combo at Reeds in Walker in 1987. 6 foot Garcia rod with Abu 6500, 36lb Cortland dacron line and a solid steel leader. Used for quite a few years and tried desperately to catch my 100th Muskies Inc. release with same combo but after losing several fish went back to my more modern equipment. It was a real eye opener and had me wondering how I was able to land as many fish as I did on it. |
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Posts: 20188
Location: oswego, il | I have found a decent use for these very short rods. Musky club pool demos. Your less likely to have a club member launch a bait into the steel rafters overhead. |
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Posts: 46
| I started with that same 5.5" Fenwick glass that horsehunter mentioned. I paired it with a Abu 6000C initially and then a Shimano Bantam 500 when they came out.I still have all three and still use the 6000C on occasion. |
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Posts: 486
Location: Northern Illinois | I had an Ambassadeur Ultra Mag II with a 7' Berkley Lightning Rod in the mid-late 80's I used for bass and muskies. A few years later, the first dedicated muskie rod was a 7'6" G Loomis, and the reel was an Abu Garcia Morrum M6600CL. I still have the reel. |
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Posts: 265
| Smell_Esox - 3/4/2021 10:24 AM
Cabelas Fish Eagle blank, 6' 2" with a silver 5500. Made it myself. Then I bought the 7' 6" blank and made that one and put a 6500 on that one.
Howdy,
Same here, except I bought mine. 25 years later I still use them for pike fly-ins and for friends to have a combo to use and abuse.
Take care,
Ruddiger |
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| Related to this, is it just faulty memory or did the Dacron line we all used back in the day have a short life span? |
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Posts: 1285
Location: Hayward, Wisconsin | My first serious outfit was a 5' Heddon Pal solid glass rod and a Pflueger Supreme reel loaded with 30# test nylon Cortland Camoflage line (had to retie every two hours or so). I also remember my dad using older "stuff", i.e. a 4 1/2 foot steel Gep rod and a Shakespeare President reel and a Pflueger Rocket reel.
Remember breaking 3 of the offset handle Heddon Pal rods just casting (pot metal handles). Love today's "stuff"! |
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Posts: 742
| North of 8 - 3/5/2021 10:19 AM
Related to this, is it just faulty memory or did the Dacron line we all used back in the day have a short life span? Your right. After about two to three hrs. of casting, the line would start to appear frayed near the leader. Poor abrasion resistance, but it was low stretch and back in its day put many trophy fish in the boat. But that's all we had, until the copolymers. Kdawg |
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Posts: 20188
Location: oswego, il | kdawg - 3/5/2021 12:29 PM
North of 8 - 3/5/2021 10:19 AM
Related to this, is it just faulty memory or did the Dacron line we all used back in the day have a short life span? Your right. After about two to three hrs. of casting, the line would start to appear frayed near the leader. Poor abrasion resistance, but it was low stretch and back in its day put many trophy fish in the boat. But that's all we had, until the copolymers. Kdawg
It also eventually rotted, became brittle and not was very wet! |
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Posts: 23
| Musky Mojo ; 8 ' with Daiwa Lexa 400 high gear |
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Posts: 267
| Built the Cabelas rods back in the late 80s and we spooled them up with Stren Prime because that's what Joe Bucher was pushing at the time. LOL. It actually wasn't terrible for stretch, but then we switched to dacron. |
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Location: Canada | 7' Conolon and a 6500 |
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Posts: 43
| It was 1992 -93 at the Chicago musky expo at kane county fair grounds.
7' custom glooms with a calcutta 400. Had to wait for two months for the rod.
I still use the reel to this day, granted it's at Mat"s right now getting rebuilt for the third time.
And the rod is hanging on the wall. |
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Posts: 371
Location: SW Ohio | A Berkley bass flipping stick with Shimano Bantam bait caster reel. Then changed "up" to a BPS musky rod and an AG 5500 round reel. |
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Posts: 381
| It was 1982. The pole was a South Bend 6'4" Heavy Tony Rizzo model. Abu Garcia 5500 reel. I fished primarily 6" Black Suicks, Mepps bucktails and Black/Red Hawg Wobbler. I still have all of them. |
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Posts: 7012
Location: Northwest Chicago Burbs | ghoti - 3/4/2021 10:32 AM
5 foot Husky Cisco Kid glass rod paired with a Pflueger Supreme. Still have the combo hanging on the wall. Guess I've been 'stamped'.
5' 1954 St. Croix and a Phlueger Supreme circa 1940. |
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Posts: 3819
| A pool stick South Bend Rizzo and a 5000 series Abu. Around '83. |
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Posts: 906
Location: Warroad, Mn | Fenwick PLP56 with a 5000 Garcia. 5'6" two piece fiberglass! I still have it some where. Sounds like other folks had the same rod. Caught my first muskie with it! |
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| Daiwa Millionaire with a 5'6" rod. Still have the reel, the rod broke off above the handle after a few years. |
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Posts: 1222
Location: E. Tenn | Esoxrox - 3/7/2021 9:29 PM
Daiwa Millionaire with a 5'6" rod.
Caught my biggest chinook, chunking a Lil Cleo from the Michigan City breakwater in '81. Same setup, spooled with 27# Cortland dacron, and a mono leader.
Like you I still have the reel. |
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Posts: 229
Location: Plover, WI | Berkley Technique 6'4" H rod with a Quantum 1421 MG spooled with Dupont Magnum 14/40 oval mono...
Still have both the rod and reel
Edited by c44hmusky 3/8/2021 6:43 PM
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Posts: 36
Location: Central Illinois | Mid 70's put together my first outfit. Bought an ABU6000 from Gibson's sporting goods in Bloomington IL. At another shop found a boat rod (musky tackle was non existent in central Illinois at the time) - cut the handle down (it was like 20' long) - filled the reel with 28lb Cortland musky line - thought I was in knee high clover. Still have the Abu and the box it came in. |
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Posts: 269
Location: Oregon, WI | The 'Pete Mania' combo from Bass Pro. They lasted years and were pretty bullet prof but when the reel did break and I sent them in for repair to them, they always just sent me a 'new/refurbished' one. I still have 4 of those combos. Two in high ratio and two in the low ratio. |
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Posts: 32830
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | I remember when the Lews Speed Spool was released. Shag Shahid got me one after handing me one at a Merc National tournament. I tossed a practice plug with complete amazement. Can't remember the rod it went on but eventually, it ended up on a boron rod, I believe it was a Browning. I caught a ton of fish on that outfit. My first casting reel was an Abu 5000, that one was on an Abu rod as well. I think I got that for my 15th birthday about 54 years ago. |
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Posts: 3478
Location: Elk River, Minnesota | When I first started casting for muskies, it was on an old fiberglass two-piece rod from the 60's paired with a green Johnson Century Spin cast reel.
My first purchased rod was the good old Eagle claw 5' - 6" yellow with blue foam handle. It was the first 2-handed casting rod I owned. Paired that with an ambassadeur 5000. Still have the reel yet today, but the rod is long gone.
Used Dacron to start...I think 40 pound, but when berkeley cofilament came out, I switched to that for a while before going on to mason spectra.
Oh how times have changed.... |
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Posts: 20188
Location: oswego, il | My first rod at 5 years old was a zebco 202 combo. Caught my first pike on it on a tiny lake right next to woman lake in minnesota. Caught it on a mepps minnow which was my very first lure. My very first baitcaster was a 5000 with 12lb mono and a pistol grip 5'6" graphite Garcia bass rod. No palming plate. It was alot of money for a paperboy over 100 bucks for the combo. |
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Posts: 36
| I bought a Pflueger Supreme reel on a 5' 6" steel rod at a yard sale Put dacron line on it Direct drive and I lost alot of hide off my knuckles with that thing. Upgraded the next year to a 6' Eagle Claw snagger special with a 5500 Abu on it You could either fish with that rod or shoot pool it was so stiff
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Posts: 1244
| Fished with a old glass Bass rod I found in in my grandpa's garage and put my grandma's old red Ambassadeur 5000 with some old black line on the reel for a couple weeks then in the middle of August Crossroads in Eagle River (Crossroads and Spiess were the tackle places in Eagle river WI in 1977) then I bought a old glass 5' 6" ish pool cue type rod with wooden handles for 16 dollars caught my first Northern and Muskie on this rod. |
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Posts: 44
Location: Mississippi | Started in mid 80's with 2 - St Croix Premier 6'2" H, 2- St Croix Premier 6'6" MH all with silver Garcia 6500C lined with 36lbs Dacron line and 2- St Croix Premier 6' H spinning with 2- Shimano 500AX spinning reels spooled with mono. Still have them all to this day. |
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Posts: 38
| Diawa Millionaire reel with a 5'5" Brule fiberglass rod and had 36# dacron on it. This was in 1980. I was 15 at the time and I went to practice cast in the backyard and got a backlash that ended up getting wrapped around the telephone lines about 40 feet up that ran through our backyard. So much for the first spool of line! I had to cut it off and the line was wrapped on the phone lines for a couple of years. |
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Posts: 267
Location: Central Pennsylvania | This was a mere two and a half years ago, musky innovations bulldawg predator H and a calcutta 400b spooled up with 80lb powerpro. |
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Posts: 492
Location: midwest | Skyline rod (sub 6') and a Daiwa millionaire with black dacron....amazing that you could fish effectively with one such short rod and a couple baits back then compared to the technical marvels we use today! I remember seeing an early model minnowbait (maybe an early grandma) in a hayward shop and thinking how in the world could you throw that for an entire day! |
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What was your first Musky Rod and Reel?