I love trolling in the spring time with a fly rod, I use one every spring. If you want a good deal I would check out LL Beans Quest fly rods you can get rod/reel/line/and case for about $89. Spare spools are I think 10 or 15 bucks extra. I would get floating line and just add a sink tip to get it down. Or get sinking line. Depends if your going to just use it for trolling or not. I run floating line with a sink tip with about 30ft of 4lbs mono. It gets me down about 10ft or so. I like LL bean because If you brake it they replace it for free and It's an excuse to go to ll bean in maine.
Also, The quest is a good rod to learn on. If you want to learn how to fly fish. I would get about a 5 or 6wt rod. 8'6". And when sept. comes to an end and winni closes you take your fly rod to the Merry meeting river in alton and throw a mickey finn on and catch the salmon in the river till the end of oct. But, if your looking for something just to troll with and don't want to spend alot of money. Go to walmart and buy a scientific fly rod and reel for $40 which works just as good. Still I would use a 5 or 6wt rod. Hope this helps
Dan

thanks! Im assuming its ok to catch the salmon in the river cause the rivers are open for fishing until oct 15th I believe!

get the cortland 333 trolling line, its the longest one out there and its also the cheapest one. its a size 8 sinking level line thats 150 feet long and trolls well on a 6 weight rod. its not a casting line so dont worry about the line weight being off. i fish this, then leadcore later on, look for a large fly reel about 3.5-4 inch diameter atleast as its a lot of work winding lots of line on small reels. for trolling, any cheap rod will work, for casting, you want to find something better, if your casting streamers, maybe a 6 or 7 weight rod, i use a very high end stiff 5 weight but its not something i would recommend to someone starting out, you would hate it. there are several companies that make rods in the 200 dollar category that are pretty close to the 700 dollar rods performance wise for casting

http://www.robs-fly-shop.com/fly_lines_1.htm

fishlessman when you say sinking level fly line does that mean it sinks to a certain depth and stays there?

Floating line with a sinking tip is a good all around line. Cortland 444 is good. For trolling, I have an 8 1/2 foot Ugly Stick. I love this rod. Nice and stiff for using leadcore. Not a good rod to learn how to cast. My casting rod is a St Croix 5-6 wt 4 piece. If you can afford a $200 rod, there is NO comparison compared with using a cheap rod. Casts like a dream. Ugly Stick has a Pfleuger Medalist. It's the bigger of the two they make. The Uglystick is around $40 and the medalist is around $35 I think.

no, its a uniform sink level line which means that it sinks at the same rate throughout its lenght and there is no taper . there are other sink sines for casting that have tapers, but they are not ideal for trolling. this is the traditional trolling fly line other than using lead core and its long enough to get it far away from the boat. the casting tapered lines are double the price.

I run cortlands they are very good rods for the money make sure you put on a level sinking line which means it does not taper towards the end where your leader is tied on its the same diameter at both ends. we run on my boat a 5/6 WT and also run a 7/8 fiberglass cortland this rod rocks!!! It goes a little deeper that the 5/6 WT rod. All my rods are matched up with the correct WT rating of the rod this is very inportant for the rod to perform correctly. If you get a salmon on a fly rod its the best trust me!!!Good luck!!!

Charlies charters

for the first 4 to 6 weeks after ice out I troll sinking fly line on my fly rods. I have been doing this for many years with great success, and there is nothing like battling a 3 to 4 pounder with a fly rod. I use dbs top guns and streamer flies with much success. good luck.

You may want to go with either a 6 or 7 wt. rod for trolling and casting.

IMHO I don't think you can beat a Temple Fork flyrod for the money. http://www.templeforkflyrods.com/rods/series1.html

As for reels I think it's just a matter of preference and what you want to spend. I don't think a high end fly reel with adjustable drag is as necessary for FW as it is for SW. Mainly due to the diffferences in environments and heavy drag required for SW fish. But that's just my opinion and I personally like finely machined reels.

I'm just a rookie trolling in fresh water. The last couple of years I have been using my SW striper rod and reel (Sage 9wt with a Teton reelwhich is overkill) with a Cortland 425 gr. sinktip but it's been effective at Quabbin.

I'm thinking of trying my old Fenwick fiberglass this year with a full sinking 6wt line. As my 4wt with a sinktip just doesn't seem to work for trolling.


YMMV.