It was really neat to start off 2011 with an article in the "Blogger Issue" of Blood Knot Magazine. For those of you that didn't check it out yet I thought I'd post the article that I submitted for the issue. Give it a read and let me know what you think.
Twenty years ago I walked out of a discount sporting goods store in Northern Michigan with a painted yellow fiberglass fly rod, a simple clicker reel, and a cheap blue plastic fly line. After a couple years of teaching myself how to fly cast and catching hundreds of bluegills on foam spiders I put away the gaudy fly rod and purchased several graphite fly rods which I fished exclusively for years. Little did I know that my preferences for fly rods would go full circle and my first fly rod would open the door fifteen years later to an ever interesting realm of fly fishing with it's own history, rod builders, anglers, and collectors.
There are a lot of good reasons why I prefer to fish fiberglass and it’s not because I want or need to double haul a whole fly line. Fiberglass fly rods shine in the trout line weights, cast superbly at distances where fish are, and are best in lengths to about eight foot (give or take a few inches) long. Glass blank makers also haven’t forgotten how useful some of the atypical fly rod lengths can be and it’s not hard to come across a seven foot five weight which is a personally one of my favorite fly rod configurations since it does great work on canopy covered rivers and creeks.
There is a thought process among the masses that glass rods are nothing more than floppy whips and unable to control big fish. This simply isn’t true and I’ve found that a full flexing fly rod can provide unreal leverage since you are fighting the fish over the entire length of fly rod. There is a strength in those glass fibers that can deftly turn a fish with relative ease all while you can feel the cork bending under the pressure in your hand. It’s a neat experience for sure.
I have a thing for fishing small flies on 6X or 7X to large trout and find that glass fly rods protect tippets to the point that I hardly worry about breaking fish off. If the knot’s good then the tippet separating is typically not an issue. The medium action of the glass rod absorbs the shock of violent head shakes, jumps, and runs of the fish upstream and down.
There is a geek factor to all of this as well since I enjoy fishing glass fly rods (reels too) that are nearly twice as old as I am and find that vintage does not mean fragile. These rods can do work just like they could decades ago. I also get very excited to collect fly rods from talented blank makers and builders who are pushing the envelope of what contemporary glass can do. New advancements in taper design, build techniques, and raw materials are creating generations of glass fly rods that are certainly changing the minds of those that thought glass was so 1960’s.
Taking the idea of the typical fiberglass fly rod to it’s most elementary terms and you have a tool that is just a thrill to fight fish on, big or small. Fishing glass is a different experience over much of the new age graphite out there and it’s sure to leave you with a smile on your face when the rod is bent double and you can feel every part of the fish’s fight like you never have before.
WHY GLASS?
Twenty years ago I walked out of a discount sporting goods store in Northern Michigan with a painted yellow fiberglass fly rod, a simple clicker reel, and a cheap blue plastic fly line. After a couple years of teaching myself how to fly cast and catching hundreds of bluegills on foam spiders I put away the gaudy fly rod and purchased several graphite fly rods which I fished exclusively for years. Little did I know that my preferences for fly rods would go full circle and my first fly rod would open the door fifteen years later to an ever interesting realm of fly fishing with it's own history, rod builders, anglers, and collectors.
There are a lot of good reasons why I prefer to fish fiberglass and it’s not because I want or need to double haul a whole fly line. Fiberglass fly rods shine in the trout line weights, cast superbly at distances where fish are, and are best in lengths to about eight foot (give or take a few inches) long. Glass blank makers also haven’t forgotten how useful some of the atypical fly rod lengths can be and it’s not hard to come across a seven foot five weight which is a personally one of my favorite fly rod configurations since it does great work on canopy covered rivers and creeks.
There is a thought process among the masses that glass rods are nothing more than floppy whips and unable to control big fish. This simply isn’t true and I’ve found that a full flexing fly rod can provide unreal leverage since you are fighting the fish over the entire length of fly rod. There is a strength in those glass fibers that can deftly turn a fish with relative ease all while you can feel the cork bending under the pressure in your hand. It’s a neat experience for sure.
I have a thing for fishing small flies on 6X or 7X to large trout and find that glass fly rods protect tippets to the point that I hardly worry about breaking fish off. If the knot’s good then the tippet separating is typically not an issue. The medium action of the glass rod absorbs the shock of violent head shakes, jumps, and runs of the fish upstream and down.
There is a geek factor to all of this as well since I enjoy fishing glass fly rods (reels too) that are nearly twice as old as I am and find that vintage does not mean fragile. These rods can do work just like they could decades ago. I also get very excited to collect fly rods from talented blank makers and builders who are pushing the envelope of what contemporary glass can do. New advancements in taper design, build techniques, and raw materials are creating generations of glass fly rods that are certainly changing the minds of those that thought glass was so 1960’s.
Taking the idea of the typical fiberglass fly rod to it’s most elementary terms and you have a tool that is just a thrill to fight fish on, big or small. Fishing glass is a different experience over much of the new age graphite out there and it’s sure to leave you with a smile on your face when the rod is bent double and you can feel every part of the fish’s fight like you never have before.
4 comments:
Good stuff! Inspires me to get some glass.
very nice Cameron!
well put about the glass rod! nice photos!
I've been looking at your site for a while, and even though I've only ever fished graphite I feel pretty confident that my next rod will be glass, especially after reading this article. Everything you described sounds like pure heaven to me, especially since my preferred destinations are small Appalachian streams where short rods and casts are ideal. Thanks for the post!
Zachary...thanks for the comment. I really appreciate it.
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