I recently read stories about the largest fish anglers were able to land with 501 and 500 Jigmasters. It was fun reading and got me thinking about what cool stories are out there involving the smaller Penns reels. Is anyone here interested in sharing about memorable fish caught with Surfmasters, Squidders, Beachmasters, or similar sized Penn reels? I'll bet many of you have awesome stories. Hopefully I get to read about some of them.
Well,with a Jigmaster one might upgrade it with today's menu into a state well beyond what a reel twice its size could do 60 years ago....that said, the WR red drum, around 92 lbs, was caught on a Squidder if memory serves. I caught a ray around a hundred on a Squidder while drum fishing. Or maybe I was ray fishing. I seemed to catch more rays than drum.
Jigmasters are widely used here in Hawaii surfcasting till this day. My friend Casey Sakamoto landed many big GT/ Ulua from shore using stock 500 jigs with 40lb mono mainline. The biggest were in the 80-90lb range using stock 500 jigmasters, incredible catches even on a full upgraded reel with extra wide superjig kit. This was done in spots with very shallow water, which limits the fish on how fast and far it can run. Not a chance for someone to stop a fish that large in deep water spots on Oahu in the 60-80'+ depth range
Thanks for sharing. I enjoyed reading your posts. Those were some big fish.