If you’ve spent much time around anglers, chances are you’ve heard them talk about their fishing rods and fishing poles. You might have even wondered if there is a difference between the terms, or if it is simply a “soda vs. pop” sort of thing.
To put it simply, what most people in North America refer to as “fishing poles” are, in fact, fishing rods. Anything that has line guides, a reel seat, and a reel attached to it is a fishing rod and is meant for casting lures. Fishing poles, on the other hand, simply have line attached to their tip. They are meant for placing bait quietly and precisely.
Frankly, it’s a petty thing to worry about so if you’ve grown up your whole life calling rods poles, go right ahead and keep it up. Only a fishing snob would correct you!
Why the Confusion?
Part of the reason people mistake these terms is simply that their fathers and grandfathers before them used the term “fishing pole,” so that’s what people grew up knowing.
At one point in the past, a line attached to a stick was the main tool anglers had to catch fish. Modern fishing reels have only been around a few hundred years and accessible to the masses for even less. Those who couldn’t afford these fancy contraptions had no need for a fishing rod, and caught their fish with handline or by attaching some line to the end of a stick – the fishing pole.
This isn’t exactly a life or death error so there’s been no need for correction, so the mistake has carried on for generations.
The issue is compounded, interestingly, by SEO enthusiasts. You see, those of us writing these posts on the internet generally want someone to read them, so we try to write for terms we think people will search for to enable them to encounter our websites. With the term “fishing pole” being so common in the United States, you’ll find many bloggers use it for this reason. To be fair, I have too on occasion. No harm, no foul as it helps us get information to you, but it certainly contributes to the confusion.
Fishing with Rods
I have no hard data to back this up aside from my 30 years on the water, but I will tell you point blank, very few anglers in North America use fishing poles. Almost everyone uses a fishing rod.
Fishing rods cast lures through the air. Hopefully towards water, but often towards trees. Let’s face it: always towards trees when children are involved. In any event, they’re meant to cast a lure towards distance targets, at which point the lure is retrieved through the water column, hopefully drawing a strike.
Advantages to Using Fishing Rods
Using a conventional rod and reel set up has many advantages over less viable fishing poles. These include:
- Increased casting distance.
- A wider range of available presentations.
- An ability to cover water quickly in search of fish.
Increased Casting Distance
If your reel is properly set up, and your lure is of an appropriate weight for the rod, you can get incredible casting distance with by using fishing rods. With time, you can also increase your accuracy, especially when you’re casting short distances with techniques such as “flipping and pitching,” though you’ll never be as accurate as using a pole to simply plunk some bait right where you want it.
Because you are flinging a lure through the air, its momentum carries it a great distance. If you are throwing with the wind, this distance can increase even more.
How to Maximize Your Casting Distance
If you’re using a rod to be able to cast out far, you might as well learn how to cast it as far as possible. Here are some tips for how you can increase it:
Proper Lure Weight
You always want to match the weight of your lure to your rod’s power. Most manufacturers will print this information right on the rod blank. For example, my son’s Ugly Stik Elite is an ultralight model. It is rated for lures that weigh between 1/32 and 1/4 oz. A lure lighter or heavier than this wouldn’t cast as far as one that was within scope.
Consider Your Fishing Line
The thicker the diameter of your fishing line, generally the less distance that your rod will cast. This is due to friction on the reel. Thinner lines will tend to cast a lot farther (and also get your bait deeper) for this reason. With that said, there’s a balance to everything, because some baitcasters are hard to use with very thin lines and need a minimum diameter to function easily.
Longer Fishing Rods Cast Further
Generally speaking, the longer the rod, the further the cast. There are limits to this of course – you need to have room to wield the larger rods. They won’t do you much good if you’re fishing from a tree-lined bank or in your kayak. There, you’ll want a shorter rod so you can get appropriate leverage and backswing to launch your lures.
Greater Variety of Presentations
I had a spirited rant in another article about “The Bait Monkey,” which is this evil doer who causes… nay, forces fishermen to part with their paychecks for the widest arrange of lures known to man.
While I’m sure this dastardly monkey also visits Europe and other lands that favor fishing poles instead of rods, I can’t imagine it is so sinister there simply because your presentation options are more limited if your exclusively using vertical presentations.
With a fishing rod, you’re able to work the entire water column. You can explore the depths by bouncing jigs along the bottom, the middle of the lake with crankbaits that dive to various depths, and the topwater with poppers and buzzbaits. Rods can toss anything the fish want, at any given time.
You Can Cover More Water
This same versatility of presentations is one of the reasons you can cover more water with a fishing rod than a fishing pole. Because you’re casting and retrieving lures, you get to search for fish everywhere between you and as far as you can cast. You can cast to multiple angles quickly, targeting a different one each time until you have thoroughly probed the entire area.
It’s also easier to walk around with rods if you’re fishing on foot. Modern fishing poles can be as large as 60′! Even though many are telescopic (think of how a telescope compacts), many aren’t! Imagine having to construct one of these at each site you want to fish. Just watch the first 30 seconds of this video and tell me that you could do that all day.
Disadvantages to Fishing Rods
While most people in North America use them, there are a few disadvantages to fishing rods. For starters, they are generally a less accurate way to present bait or lures than fishing poles. Secondly, they have more equipment and parts, which means there are more things to go wrong, and more widgets (such as reels) to upkeep. Finally they can be more expensive, all things considered. While I’m sure you could find an example of an expensive fishing pole, it doesn’t have a reel and you won’t be as susceptible to the Bait Monkey.
Fishing with Poles
I have to be honest, being from North America, I thought fishing poles were something that Huckleberry Finn would have used. Sure, I’ve seen a few crappie fishermen in Florida use them, but I just didn’t think it was popular equipment in this day in age. Apparently, I’d be completely wrong over in Europe or Asia as I’ll describe a bit further below. First, let’s look at a few advantages and disadvantages to using fishing poles instead of rods.
Advantages
The main advantage fishing poles have over rods is that they can present a lure or bait in a much more precise manner and in a stealthy fasion.
Precision
To use a fishing pole, one simply guides it out over the precise part of water they wish to cover, and then lowers their bait or lure down. This allows extreme precision as one can easily move past any reed or obstruction and get their bait exactly where they want it.
This could have far-reaching implications even in bass fishing. For example, consider attempting to present a Senko in a very precise pocket in a nasty weed bed. Even if you were able to flip or pitch to it accurately, you’d still need to reel it in past the weeds to get it out. While I’m not exactly certain how well a fishing pole would work to horse a bass out of that sort of cover, it would at least allow you to make an entirely vertical presentation without fouling your lure.
Stealth
Some folks who fish professionally can make a perfect cast every time that enters the water with minimal splash. Then, there is the rest of us. A fishing pole eliminates the giant splash of a lure as you simply move it out over water and then ease it in. This is a stealthier approach if the fish are spooky, at least if the pole itself doesn’t frighten them. Given that these aren’t that popular in much of North America, it might be the first time a fish has ever seen it, and they may think it’s just a stick.
Disadvantages
There are several disadvantages to fishing with a pole rather than a rod. Many were covered in the rods section (such as a fishing pole’s comparative lack of maneuverability), but there are a few more to consider.
Unwieldy
I suppose this goes hand in hand with lack of maneuverability, but the longer fishing poles out there can be difficult to wield. Many techniques, especially in Europe, appear to be best-suited for those sitting down as you need to brace an especially long pole against something to control it. There are other techniques, such as Tenkara fishing discussed below that alleviate this, but it’s something to consider depending on how you plan to fish.
Availability
I work five minutes from my local Cabelas and before COVID-19, I was there most lunch breaks. I cannot recall ever seeing a true fishing pole. Likewise, I’ve never seen one in the tackle shops I frequent. The bottom line is that depending on where you live, you might have a hard time finding one of these! This isn’t a problem if you aren’t pressed for time, but if you break your only pole and want to get back to fishing, you could be waiting awhile.
European Roach Fishing
There is a species of fish called a “roach” in Europe that anglers use enormous fishing poles to reach. If you go search the internet, you can find plenty of videos showing the tactic, such as this one here.
I’ve never tried this, but it looks as though the anglers make use of these enormous fishing poles to first deliver a ball of chum or attractant over to an area, and then to dangle a baited hook over it to catch a fish in the ensuing frenzy.
Having watched a few of these videos, I might take back the “fishing rods are more expensive” argument I made a few sections higher. Some of these folks bring entire modular towers with them that they plant into the lake or stream to allow themselves to reach even farther.
Japanese Tenkara Fishing
Tankara Fishing is a new term to me, but apparently it has been around for a few hundred years in Japan. Essentially, it is fly fishing in a stream but without a reel. You just have the fishing pole, line, hook, and bait. You still swing the fly back and forth through the air to give it some momentum before casting it, but the amount of line attached to the end of your line is all you get.
I have to say, I’m a bit intrigued by this. I think it might be a decent technique for children, as it isn’t that complicated and the poles aren’t too long or heavy, at least compared to the roach poles in Europe. Who knows, if I try this out with my son, maybe it’ll someday make its way into my book’s sequel.
While researching this article, I learned that this technique was brought to North American in 2009 by a company called Tenkara USA. They have a website that discusses how to get started with the technique, and also offer started packs with everything you need to catch a fish besides the stream.
If you’re into minimalist fishing (and with kids, that might be a good thing) then you might want to give this technique a shot.
Conclusion: It’s Mostly Semantics
While there’s always going to be “that guy” who gets uppity if you call a fishing rod a fishing pole, let’s face it — it’s semantics, and a trifling one at that. Call it what you want, the bottom line is they both catch fish.
The only time I’d be concerned about the difference is if I was booking a charter in another country. You’ll want to know what kind of equipment your guide is using so you can tell what sort of experience you’re about to have. While I could go for some Tenkara fishing, I’m not sure I could deal with sitting in one spot waiting for a roach to bite.
I hope this article helped quell your insatiable thirst for information on this exceptionally important topic. If you have other pressing questions, poke around my site a bit as you’ll learn wondrous lessons such as if you can fish with dead worms, or use WD-40 as fishing attractant. Armed with this trifecta of knowledge, you will crush all fish before you!
Finally, I’d like to invite you to join my Facebook page so I can keep in touch with updated content and fishing reports.
Thanks,
-John Paxton
