Is there any advantage in a spey rod?

In article , Peter Charles
wrote:

On Sun, 23 Nov 2003 17:10:08 +0000, Lazarus Cooke
wrote:



Recently, though, (viz., in the past ten years or so), I've seen rods
marketed in two fifteen foot versions, one normal, one so-called "spey"
rods. The distinction seems daft to me.

Lazarus


Ahhh, well look at my first post about the three schools and the
distinction is no longer daft. It's pretty hard to use shooting heads
proficiently on a rod that was designed to lift and cast a long line.
It can be done but it isn't half as much fun compared to using the
right rod for the job.

Sure. A shooting head is a shooting head. Which you can use with an
overhead cast or a spey cast. And a spey cast is a spey cast. Which
you can use with a shooting head (although I'd never do so) or a DT or
whatever. What's one to do with the other?

L

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On Mon, 24 Nov 2003 09:52:20 +0000, Lazarus Cooke
wrote:

In article , Peter Charles
wrote:

On Sun, 23 Nov 2003 17:10:08 +0000, Lazarus Cooke
wrote:



Recently, though, (viz., in the past ten years or so), I've seen rods
marketed in two fifteen foot versions, one normal, one so-called "spey"
rods. The distinction seems daft to me.

Lazarus


Ahhh, well look at my first post about the three schools and the
distinction is no longer daft. It's pretty hard to use shooting heads
proficiently on a rod that was designed to lift and cast a long line.
It can be done but it isn't half as much fun compared to using the
right rod for the job.

Sure. A shooting head is a shooting head. Which you can use with an
overhead cast or a spey cast. And a spey cast is a spey cast. Which
you can use with a shooting head (although I'd never do so) or a DT or
whatever. What's one to do with the other?

L

Would you call a Perry Poke a Spey cast or a Skagit cast? If you call
all casts that depend on a D-loop, a "Spey" cast then it's pretty
difficult to draw a distinction. You say you've never casted a
shooting head, perhaps that's why you're having problems with the
notion of different styles of rods and lines.

Basically, long-line casting technique with DTs or long belly WF lines
depends on a big D-Loop. A moderate, through action rod casts them
very well. Now strap on a shooting head or a short belly WF line and
try it. It'll cast, but not with the same proficiency. Try it again
with what Sage calls their Euro rods (fast, tip-to-middle action) and
watch them fly.

Peter

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Peter Charles wrote:

Basically, long-line casting technique with DTs or long belly WF lines
depends on a big D-Loop. A moderate, through action rod casts them
very well. Now strap on a shooting head or a short belly WF line and
try it. It'll cast, but not with the same proficiency. Try it again
with what Sage calls their Euro rods (fast, tip-to-middle action) and
watch them fly.

Peter, would you say Sage's 9141-4 "European" is a longer casting rod
than the 9140-4 "Traditional"? Would the latter be a better (i.e., more
forgiving) rod for a novice?

JR

In article , Peter Charles
wrote:

Would you call a Perry Poke a Spey cast or a Skagit cast?

I don't know what either a Perry Poke or a Skagit cast are
If you call
all casts that depend on a D-loop, a "Spey" cast then it's pretty
difficult to draw a distinction.

I'd call casts that depend on a D-loop a roll cast (some people here
also call it a switch cast). For me fundamental to a Spey cast is a
change of direction.


You say you've never casted a
shooting head, perhaps that's why you're having problems with the
notion of different styles of rods and lines.

No. Just with the distinction between a rod specially made for Spey
casting. Partly, I suppose, because I may well end up doing both Spey
and overhead casts on the same river on the same day. I don't really
want to carry two rods around for which way the wind happens to be, and
how awkward the bank is behind me.

Lazarus

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On Sun, 23 Nov 2003 17:10:08 +0000, Lazarus Cooke
wrote:

In article , Lazarus
Cooke wrote:

I've always spey cast, some of the time. This whole business of special
rods for spey casting is quite recent. Are they really any better for
spey casting, or is just a gimmick?

Lazarus

Sorry I didn't explain well enough. I didn't say I didn't know what a
spey cast is, or where it comes from. I know the Spey well ** indeed,
if you want to learn about the early Spey flies you could do worse
than to look at a book by a distant relative, "Autumns on the Spey".

I live in Britain, where people have always used the long rod for
salmon. So I have always used a fifteen rod for salmon fishing. (or
most of the time. On some west country rivers I'll use a nine foot
trout rod, which works very well, but for the bigger, rocky rivers in
Scotland or Ireland I'll generally use a fifteen or twelve foot rod, as
much to control the line in the water as for length of casting.)

So, depending on the direction of the wind, the state of the bank and
so on, I'll sometimes cast overhand, sometimes spey. I was taught to
spey cast at the same time as I learnt to cast overhand.

Recently, though, (viz., in the past ten years or so), I've seen rods
marketed in two fifteen foot versions, one normal, one so-called "spey"
rods. The distinction seems daft to me.

Lazarus


Penny dropped. You're wondering why North Americans refer to "spey"
rods when you would call it a "salmon" rod. Correct? It's just the
name that's caught on over here, the rods are the same. There's
always been a terminology problem over here as "two-hander" is too big
a mouthful and "salmon" is pretty useless when we use them for chasing
steelhead.

There also basically two classes of two-handed rods which Sage has a
addressed with it's "Euro" and "Traditional" models but these names
haven't widely caught on. Despite these attempts, we tend to call any
long fly rod with a two-handed grip a "spey" rod.

As I mentioned earlier, the two classes of rods are based on shooting
head vs. long line. In the UK, shooting head rods aren't that common
yet so I'm not surprised that you find the distinction useless. Spend
some time doing the Skagit or underhand casts with different rods and
you might have a different appreciation. I spent a couple of days
recently casting rods using short belly and medium belly lines as part
of a group contributing to a magazine article on "spey" rods. We
performed both Skagit and Spey casts with each rod, using both lines.
There was an amazing difference in some rods when we switched from
short to medium bellied lines. There is only 10' difference in the
head so you'd think the difference would be negligible, but no, some
rods were useless with the short heads and others were useless with
the long ones. There were six of us casting and we were unanimous in
our opinions about this. There's no doubt in my mind that some rods
work well with DTs and traditional spey casting while others work much
better with the short heads.

We were also affected by the lack of a standardized rating system for
lines and rods. None of us liked the new fast Hardy's on the short
lines but loved them on the long. In retrospect, they weren't getting
loaded on the short lines and we should have gone up a line weight.

I think we'll see the so-called spey-action rods disappear from the
market as the faster rods take over. I own a Lamiglas that was made
to Mike Maxwell's "true spey rod" standards and it handles a DT very
nicely. It will cast shooting heads but it isn't pleasant or
efficient. The newer, faster rods seemed to do both jobs well so
there doesn't seem to be a reason for maintaining a distinction.
Given that Hardy has introduced two fast action cannons, the days of
the slow rod have to be numbered. One of the Loomis reps in the group
normally fishes with a GLX but on casting the Hardy Gem, he fell in
love and said that were it not for his Loomis affiliation, he would
toss his GLX for the Gem.

Give it a few years Lazarus and, except for some UK diehards, we'll be
back to only one type of rod.



Peter

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Peter I spent a couple of days recently casting rods using short
Peter belly and medium belly lines as part of a group contributing to
Peter a magazine article on "spey" rods.

Peter,

This is a most interesting thread that I've been following very
closely. Could you drop us another line on the topic once the magazine
gets out.

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On 25 Nov 2003 09:29:23 +0200, Jarmo Hurri
wrote:


Peter I spent a couple of days recently casting rods using short
Peter belly and medium belly lines as part of a group contributing to
Peter a magazine article on "spey" rods.

Peter,

This is a most interesting thread that I've been following very
closely. Could you drop us another line on the topic once the magazine
gets out.


Sure, no problem

Peter

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In article , Peter Charles
wrote:

Penny dropped.

SNIP


Give it a few years Lazarus and, except for some UK diehards, we'll be
back to only one type of rod.


Yes, it took me a while (I've only just seen the two posts where you
explained it) to realize that we've been arguing at cross-purposes.

I think, though, that for once a certain amount of light was generated
along with the heat!

Very interesting. Thanks for the discussion.

I must admit that I tend to the European tendency of being ridiculously
old-fashioned (I still fish (sometimes) for trout with cane and silk),
and I fish fairly elderly Bruce and Walker salmon rods. For some
reason, while most British fishers like Hardy for trout, there's been a
tendency - probably encouraged by the great recent writers on salmon
such as Hugh Falkus - to favour Bruce and Walker for salmon.

I haven't fished the new salmon rods. I only fish my Sage 3 8 9s
because I was once in "City tackle" or something like that in New York,
and the owner persuaded me to buy one. One of the best purchases I've
ever made.

:Lazarus

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On Tue, 25 Nov 2003 15:31:51 +0000, Lazarus Cooke
wrote:

In article , Peter Charles
wrote:

Penny dropped.

SNIP


Give it a few years Lazarus and, except for some UK diehards, we'll be
back to only one type of rod.


Yes, it took me a while (I've only just seen the two posts where you
explained it) to realize that we've been arguing at cross-purposes.

I think, though, that for once a certain amount of light was generated
along with the heat!

Very interesting. Thanks for the discussion.

I must admit that I tend to the European tendency of being ridiculously
old-fashioned (I still fish (sometimes) for trout with cane and silk),
and I fish fairly elderly Bruce and Walker salmon rods. For some
reason, while most British fishers like Hardy for trout, there's been a
tendency - probably encouraged by the great recent writers on salmon
such as Hugh Falkus - to favour Bruce and Walker for salmon.

I haven't fished the new salmon rods. I only fish my Sage 3 8 9s
because I was once in "City tackle" or something like that in New York,
and the owner persuaded me to buy one. One of the best purchases I've
ever made.

:Lazarus


If your interested in reading a bit more about the North American
approach to these rods, the http://speypages.com/ is a good place to
start. Dana is a Canuck working out of BC and he fishes the Thompson
among others, for steelhead through much of the year. There are some
videos on the site, describing various casts.

Ed Ward's article is a pretty good explanation of the evolution of the
North American Skagit style casts.
http://home.att.net/~slowsnap/spey16.htm



Peter

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