Big streamer rod - 7wt vs. 8wt

Howdy all!

My current trout rod arsenal consists of four rods: 2wt, 3wt, 5wt and
6wt. I am now considering adding one more rod for heavyweight work,
for larger, possibly weighted streamers and sinking lines or sink
tips.

I'm not experienced with the line weights I should be looking at - 7wt
to 9wt; my only heavier rod is a two-handed 10/11wt. In order to
select the correct weight, I did a search for the good old table with
line weights and corresponding hook sizes:

http://www.flyanglersonline.com/begin/101/part2.html

The rule of thumb read from the table says that a 7wt should handle a
#4 fly, while an 8wt can handle a size 1/0 fly.

I understand that this is just a rough guide, but I was still somewhat
surprised about this large difference between the 7wt and the
8wt. According to this table, an 8wt would most probably do the job
for me, while a 7wt wouldn't - some of the bleak imitations we use are
pretty big. But my question is: do you agree with the rough size
ranges in the table?

--
Jarmo Hurri

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Jarmo Hurri wrote:
Howdy all!

My current trout rod arsenal consists of four rods: 2wt, 3wt, 5wt and
6wt. I am now considering adding one more rod for heavyweight work,
for larger, possibly weighted streamers and sinking lines or sink
tips.

I'm not experienced with the line weights I should be looking at - 7wt
to 9wt; my only heavier rod is a two-handed 10/11wt.

Here in Texas we use all of these on a regular basis. The nine weight
will wear you out in a full day of blind casting, while you can do it
with an eight weight. The seven weight will probsably be too light for
bulky or heavy bass bugs or streamers. I would get the eight weight.

Big Dale

Big Dale wrote:

Here in Texas we use all of these on a regular basis. The nine weight
will wear you out in a full day of blind casting, while you can do it
with an eight weight. The seven weight will probsably be too light for
bulky or heavy bass bugs or streamers. I would get the eight weight.

At the risk of writing a "me too" post, BD knows what he's talking
about. My first bass rigs were 6 and 8-wt. The 6 can throw smaller
bugs OK, but if dealing with wind and big bulky flies, the 8-wt. is the
ticket. It's not as much fun to fight a fish on a rod that big (unless
you are running into some pretty large fish), but it's no fun at all to
throw big bugs with a 6-wt.

Of course, I use a 5-wt. these days for fishing my favorite river,
so what do I know? :-)


Chuck Vance

Conan ... but if dealing with wind and big bulky flies, the 8-wt. is
Conan the ticket. It's not as much fun to fight a fish on a rod that
Conan big ...

I've given serious thougth to this fighting issue, and I wonder if the
situation would be a bit better with a medium-action rod. For me, in
the lower line weights, the action of the rod does affect how "big" a
fish feels. Might be just psychological, but I used to have a fast
4wt, with which the smaller fish felt smaller than with the
medium-action 5wt that I'm using now.

So at least at the moment I'm mostly looking at the slower rods (like
Scott V2 and Sage SLT & VPS).

--
Jarmo Hurri

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Jarmo Hurri wrote:

I've given serious thougth to this fighting issue, and I wonder if the
situation would be a bit better with a medium-action rod. For me, in
the lower line weights, the action of the rod does affect how "big" a
fish feels. Might be just psychological, but I used to have a fast
4wt, with which the smaller fish felt smaller than with the
medium-action 5wt that I'm using now.

There's probably some merit to that idea. My 8-wt. is a Fenwick HMG
bought back in the early eighties. Its action is closer to fiberglass
than graphite, and it does make a difference in how big the fish feel.
When I pulled it out to practice-cast a while back, I had to totally
re-adjust my casting stroke for it.


Chuck Vance

I've given serious thougth to this fighting issue, and I wonder if
the situation would be a bit better with a medium-action rod. For
me, in the lower line weights, the action of the rod does affect
how "big" a fish feels. Might be just psychological, but I used to
have a fast 4wt, with which the smaller fish felt smaller than with
the medium-action 5wt that I'm using now.

Conan There's probably some merit to that idea. My 8-wt. is a
Conan Fenwick HMG bought back in the early eighties. Its action is
Conan closer to fiberglass than graphite, and it does make a
Conan difference in how big the fish feel.

It's intersting that some of the top rod manufacturers - most notably
Winston, Scott and T&T - no longer offer high-end medium-action rods
in 8wt. Sage still has the SLT, but otherwise I feel like I'm swimming
against the current here. One of my dealers said that "it doesn't make
sense to pay a lot of money for a medium-action rod". I don't really
understand why.

Maybe I'm just an outlier.

--
Jarmo Hurri

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On Fri, 16 Sep 2005, Jarmo Hurri wrote:

Conan ... but if dealing with wind and big bulky flies, the 8-wt. is
Conan the ticket. It's not as much fun to fight a fish on a rod that
Conan big ...

I've given serious thougth to this fighting issue, and I wonder if the
situation would be a bit better with a medium-action rod.

Not sure what sort of streamers you want to throw but if they are wind
resistant (like bass bugs) then a fast action rod will be better. For
trout I throw plenty of streamers using my 4 wt and 6 wt rods without any
difficulty.

Mu

I've given serious thougth to this fighting issue, and I wonder if
the situation would be a bit better with a medium-action rod.

Mu Not sure what sort of streamers you want to throw but if they are
Mu wind resistant (like bass bugs) then a fast action rod will be
Mu better.

Agreed. I guess that from the point of view of casting, a fast 7wt
_might_ be as good as a medium-fast 8wt. But I currently think that
from the point of view of fighting the fish, a slower 8wt would be
better than a faster 7wt. For me, that is.

Full-sinking and sink-tip lines make the equation even more
complicated. On the other hand, my two-handed rod is very slow, and
I've learned to use it quite effectively with a type IV fast-sinking
shooting head.

Mu For trout I throw plenty of streamers using my 4 wt and 6 wt rods
Mu without any difficulty.

Me too. For example, the rod that I use on most local streams is a
6'6" 3wt, on which I use a 4wt DT line. Most of the streams are not
what you would call a 'small stream', so I need to do some actual
casting with the rod. And I use - for example - heavily weighted
Woolly Buggers with no problems.

But with large flies that are very wind-resistant and/or absorb a lot
of water, using lighter gear is just not fun - especially when there's
little or no room for backcasts, and the line is just too light to
lift the fly off the water in a switch or spey cast.

--
Jarmo Hurri

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Dale Here in Texas we use all of these on a regular basis. The nine
Dale weight will wear you out in a full day of blind casting, while
Dale you can do it with an eight weight. The seven weight will
Dale probsably be too light for bulky or heavy bass bugs or
Dale streamers. I would get the eight weight.

Thanks for the voice of experience, much appreciated.

--
Jarmo Hurri

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Jarmo Hurri wrote:

My current trout rod arsenal consists of four rods: 2wt, 3wt, 5wt and
6wt.

Yikes, only four...come on man the economy of your country is depending
upon you to do better.

I'm not experienced with the line weights I should be looking at - 7wt
to 9wt; [snip]
The rule of thumb read from the table says that a 7wt should handle a
#4 fly, while an 8wt can handle a size 1/0 fly.

A premium 7wt like the Sage XP or the Winston BIIX will handle the 1/0
fly.

However, to answer your question as to which weight to target. Use the
rule of two, since your heaviest rod is a 6 weight, you can in theory
overline it one weight to make it a de facto 7 wt. By going up two
weight classifications that would suggest you consider an 8 wt. Which
depending upon the conditions and ability over or underline as you see
fit or need.