Am I crazy ? Wait, don't answer that.

OK, you all know I'm just out of my rookie season as a fisher. So I am very impressionable - not to say gullible, just easily influenced and led astray. Sometimes by my own thoughts/obsessions/compulsions, sometimes by unscrupulous acquaintances.

But what has so far been natural for me, on the bank or in a drift or power boat, is left hand retrieve.

But on a kayak it has always felt awkward, and whenever I see videos from Jeff and Mark and others, I see them using right hand retrieve and tucking the butt of the rod under their left arm cranking right hand. It just looks like it feels right.

So here's the question: Does it make absolutely no sense at all to have a LH retrieve preference in one settings, and a RH preference in others ?

Does anyone else suffer from this existential quandry ?

For my spinning reel and my fly reel I use a left hand reel.  For my level wind I use a right hand reel.  The only reason I can think of is that with the fly and spinning reel I am casting and I prefer doing that with my right hand.  With the level wind I generally feed the line out.

I usually use a left hand retrieve unless I am in my kayak.  Th reason is my rod holder is on the left side of my kayak and runs across my boat to the right.  With the right hand crank I can just reach up and adjust the depth by cranking it a couple of times instead of pulling it out of the holder and adjusting.  Granted this is more important for salmon trolling then other types of fishing since you are constantly adjusting your depth to match the bottom but I've started buying all my new reels in RH retrieve.

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I'm a righty and all my reels crank on the left.  Spinning, fly,  trolling, casting gear... doesn't matter.  It's more efficient for a variety of reasons. 

I would say personally that you want to think about what hand you will want for netting the fish. This should be your reel hand and not your rod hand, in my humble opinion.

I would say personally that you want to think about what hand you will want for netting the fish. This should be your reel hand and not your rod hand, in my humble opinion.

That makes even more sense.

Ok, kayak spinning reels are being converted, and I will inform the Procurement Dept. to start an inventory refresh of the trolling/casting reels.



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I'm with Snopro on this. Right dominant but all reels are lefty.
 Sure it limits my reel choices at times, but it works far better for me.

For my spinning reel and my fly reel I use a left hand reel.  For my level wind I use a right hand reel.  The only reason I can think of is that with the fly and spinning reel I am casting and I prefer doing that with my right hand.  With the level wind I generally feed the line out.

+1
No fly rod though.

I'm a righty and all my reels crank on the left.  Spinning, fly,  trolling, casting gear... doesn't matter.  It's more efficient for a variety of reasons.

I completely agree w Snopro, although I've been forced into ambidexterity because certain choice reels are not made in LH retrieve. With that said I also believe you should be able to pickup any reel, LH or RH, & make it happen. I've grown to appreciate the versatility. It is easier to handle the subtleties of a heavy fighting fish with the strength of your dominate arm & delicacy of the dominate thumb on the spool. You'll find your niche but go with what works & feels right, even if you have to lose a fish or two figuring it out.

Wait....

There's catching involved? 

I primarily use my gear just to drown bait or exercise lures with. 

I just started casting with level winds and conventional reels, and it took me a while to get used to turning the crank with the left hand on my left-handed reels after the cast. I also fumble with the line when holding the casting rod in my right hand while it's very natural to mend line with that same hands while using a spinning rod. I think I'm just looking for the line and reel to be below the rod.

For reels that I am casting and retrieving I prefer left handed reels, it makes sense to me since I am casting with my right hand and it is an unnecessary step to transfer the rod to my other hand to reel. For my trolling reels though I have a right hand and a left hand reel and I actually prefer the right hand reel since my rod holder in the kayak is on the right side, once I add a geartrak to the left side my preference may change (gives me an excuse to get more reels.)

If you're right handed, using left-hand retrieve reels should feel more comfortable for good reason. Since you are going to have more strength and coordination with your dominant hand, you should want to hold the rod with your dominant hand and reel with your non-dominant hand, since reeling requires far less strength and coordination. This is not how the bass fishing world works, however. For some weird reason, many people in the bass world would cast with their dominant arm, then switch hands and also crank with their dominant hand, or just simply adapt to casting with their non-dominant arm. And since the bass world was, and still is the biggest market American fishing, this idea has persisted. I've always found it really weird myself, but I can't complain since I'm left handed. Oddly enough it's the one part of society where being left-handed doesn't make me feel like the odd user.

 The terminology also makes this conversation confusing. A left-hand retrieve reel in many people's minds translates to a "left-handed" reel, when that really isn't actually true. A left-hand retrieve reel should actually be considered a right-handed reel in my mind. Leave it to fishermen to create a standard and this is what you get.

The main goal though is to understand what you're comfortable with, develop a system around it and then stick with it. I like my left-handed reels (right-hand retrieve) and subsequently, I have always felt more comfortable landing fish on my right side. This makes my right hand responsible for turning on my over-the-shoulder camera, reeling, netting, and even some rudder adjustments by reaching across my legs to the rudder control on my left side. Sticking to this format has made it significantly easier for me to land fish since I have gotten to the point where I do it the same way every time. Hope this helps!

I have my own theory about this... my dominant hand likes to be on top.   Hold a baseball bat with two hands.. which hand is on top.. your dominant one.

When I'm fishing with a spinning reel my dominant hand is holding my rod above my non-dominant hand which is on the spinning reel below.   I'm right handed so my spinning reels have their handles on the left.

When I'm fishing a conventional reel my non-dominant hand is holding the rod while my dominant hand is above it at the reel.  My conventional reels are right hand retrieve.

I am right hand dominate when it comes to writing and finer coordination, and left hand stupid in that department.  When it comes to which arm to use for holding the rod, either of my arms can do the trick.  Both are about the same in strength, and endurance.  It doesn't take much coordination or dexterity for me to hold and lift a rod with a big fish under it from either arm. 

The odd thing is that I can't cast worth a crap with my left hand with either the spinning or conventional setup, but I also find it uncomfortable reeling with the left hand with a conventional reel (above the rod), or reeling with my right hand with a spinning reel (under the rod).  I fish off the right side of my yak pretty much exclusively, unless the damn fish is picky and won't stay on that side.

Ironically, I am not really sure which of my arma is better for netting as I have only ever netted trout and those were before I got into kayak fishing.  The one fish in a kayak that I ever made the attempt to net turned out to be a 43" bull redfish that was WAYYYYY bigger than my net would every accommodate and had to be lip gripped.  And the only salmon I have ever caught in my kayak I had to lip grip as well, as I didn't have a net with me. 

So, we'll see how this goes when I ever get another salmon on the hook.