Spooling Fly Reels

[FisH_SLaYer24]

I'm getting ready for the upcoming ice season and I am going to spooling up my ice reels. Is it necessary to put any type of backing on a fly reel? If I wanted to just spool 150 yards of ice fishing line, would there be any major disadvantages to spooling up without any backing?

[Dogfish_Fishing]

It's not required, but the advanage is to fill up the spool so you increase your retrieve rate. If you are on a budget, use tip up line. you can also create a filler on your reel using foam and tape.

[BartmanMN]

You could also fill it up with cheap open water line, then use a uni to uni knot and top it off with ice line. No need to put 150 yds of ice line on a reel that you fish in 30 ft of water or less.

[Eric_Kruger]

just buy a spool of cheap dacron tip up line, fill it up to what you think is good then spool on a pony spool of ice line. for sure build up the arbor....

[Fishin4fun_MN]

I am just going to use Ice braid under my mono or copolymer ice line. I plan on a 100 yards of each (a pony).

[dfeste]

There's no need to even use new line as the backing. The reels I filled today have leadcore as backer that came off one of my trolling rods. You can even use string, just put a wrap of electrical tape around it before you put your ice mono on to prevent it from digging in.