A long cast with a small bait or lure is often the best way to catch redfish and trout on open-water flats. The right rod can make all the difference.

Whether you're using live shrimp, small pinfish or whitebaits, or tiny jigs, spoons or soft plastics, a spinning reel spooled with about 6-pound-test line and a long rod of medium/fast action are the tools you'll find most useful.

Six-pound line might be lighter than what the average flats fisherman employs, but it has some advantages if the targets are trout and slot-sized redfish. For one, you'll get better distance on your casts. In shallow water, the farther the bait is from the boat, the more fish you are likely to hook. If you are wading, the same thing applies: You will cover more water with a longer rod and 6-pound line than would be possible with a conventional 7-footer with 8- or 10-pound test.

Lighter lines are also harder for the fish to see. And you can pack more yards on a smaller reel, which means less weight and more sensitivity in the casting hand.

A good choice for this style of fishing is a 71--2- to 81--2-foot spinning rod, with a short rear grip for easier casting and fighting. The shorter grip means the reel seat is farther from the rodtip. It's the length of the rod between the face of the reel and the tip that does the work in casting, and the flex of the blank that protects light line when a fish surges. If you had two otherwise identical 7-foot rods, one with a 4-inch rear grip and one with a more conventional 8-inch grip, the rod with the shorter grip is going to cast the same as the one with the longer grip.

There are lots of good 7-foot spinning rods on the market, but if you're looking for something in the 8-foot range, you might find that the ideal combination of length, flex and power for light-tackle applications is hard to come by. Limber Pacific coast salmon and steelhead rods are perhaps the closest thing, and manufacturers are now starting to tailor these rods for Florida flats fishing. Many come with long, unwieldy grips that can be quickly converted with a hacksaw. If you like, add a butt cap from a rod building supply shop to give it a clean look. Never hesitate to carve a rod down to size--but don't forget that it takes a lot more time to replace than to cut a little more.

My own choice for reds and trout is one I made myself--a custom spinning rod built on an 8-foot graphite flyrod blank. I built it from scratch, but you can get the same results by simply retrofitting an old fly rod with a grip extension and a new set of guides. It's not a difficult project, but you will need a few special materials.

For the blank, you can strip down any fly rod rated for about a 6- or 7-weight line, the stiffer the better. If you have an old fly rod with a few inches of the tip broken off, put it to good use (you do have one of these in your closet, don't you?). Along with basic woodworking tools, you'll also need the following, most of which you can pick up at a rod building supply shop: tapered, solid fiberglass rod (a section of an old glass fishing rod will suffice, or a very hard wooden dowel), cork rings for the grip, masking tape, 5-minute epoxy kit, acetone to remove epoxy if necessary, set of high-frame spinning rod guides, winding thread, razor blade and guide wrap finish.

The first step is to remove the original extension butt or butt cap from the reel seat to get to the hollow blank inside. With some rods, it's just a matter of removing a rubber plug. If the rod has a cork fighting butt, you'll need to saw it off and use a knife to dig out the remains from inside the reel seat. If your rod has a metal cap that also serves as the rear hood on the reel seat, drill a pilot hole, and gradually enlarge it until the hollow of the original blank is exposed. Be careful not to damage the walls of the blank--it will support the extension grip you are about to build. If the blank is of very small diameter, however, you may be forced to drill out a larger hole in the reel seat.

Now take a section of tapered fiberglass rod, which will be used as a ferrule connection for the new handle, and slide it inside the existing blank until it fits snugly, about four inches up, far enough to prevent a hinging effect that could later result in breakage. If you need to, apply masking tape to the rod to fit, but don't seat it permanently yet--you'll need to remove it to build the grip. Mark it with a pencil where it will enter the existing blank, and decide how long you want the grip to be.

To fashion the grip, ream the small holes in the cork rings until they will accommodate the fiberglass mandrel. Rough up the surface of the glass with sandpaper, apply 5-minute epoxy and slide the rings on, leaving the ferrule extension exposed. Clamp the rings tightly. When the epoxy cures, use a file or wood rasp to rough the grip to shape, then sand to finish. Coat the ferrule with epoxy and fit to the hole in the original reel seat. For added strength, before fitting the ferrule you might try filing and recessing part of the cork grip inside the hollow of the reel seat.

Lastly, remove the snake guides and replace with high-frame, small diameter spinning rod guides. Placement should approximate the original flyrod guides.