Rod length in small creek fishing

"Osmo Jauhiainen" wrote in news:403121a6_1
@news.dnainternet.net:

Stones into your backpack!


Reminds me of the time we secreted a diving weight into someone
else's backpack. Hard to walk laughing like that ...

"Christ, this heavy" - lug, lug, ...

Difficult to walk laughing like that ...

;-)

Steve

Stephen First of all, Jarmo this is very different fishing: if you
Stephen haven't done it before you will be frustrated by the snaggy
Stephen trees and shrubs no matter how long your rod is. Go with
Stephen someone experienced in this style of fishing on your first
Stephen outings if you can: it will shorten the learning curve (and
Stephen two pairs of eyes are always better than one 8-). As you
Stephen 'adjust' to the confines, the fish and their habits you will
Stephen become aware of what you need in the way of a rod. It may
Stephen take a trip or two.

I think that is a sound piece of advice. I also just took a look at
Gierach's and Meck's books on small-stream fishing - might be a good
way to prepare during the winter.

Stephen 8' 5wt ...is just about right. 5wt is too heavy? Not for the
Stephen biggest fish encountered. 8' is too long? occasionally yes,
Stephen about as often as my mates 6'6" fibreglass is too short.

I just read through a number of threads at groups.google.com on this
same issue (I often forget to do a search there myself, although I
often advice other people to do so). There seemed to be no agreement
on neither the length or weight rating of the rod. Not a surprise,
really, but still...

What did surprise me was that a number of people considered weights
0-3 to be too light for this type of fishing. They said that there is
not enough punch in these weights to handle the large variety of
situations you end up in. Also, some people thought that the lightest
lines do not roll cast very well.

--
Jarmo Hurri

Commercial email countermeasures included in header email
address. Remove all garbage from header email address when replying,
or just use .

I use a 7' 5 wt. for crawling around in the brush. The streams may
be small but not necessarly the fish. The fish may be used to eating
larger insects as they get to see more bugs that fall from the
overhanging brush. I use a strike indicator to keep the leader from
sliding all the way down to the tip of the rod. Sometimes it's hard to
reach the end of the rod to pull the line out.
Another thing I've found handy in the brush is an automatic reel. The
Mitchell 710 by ABU works great.






Jarmo Hurri wrote in message . ..
The discussion about small-stream rods in a thread above brought to my
mind a closely related question I've been thinking about recently.

I have no first-hand experience on fishing bushy creeks, but a couple
of months ago I heard that there are some really interesting ones
nearby where I live. So I will most certainly be checking out some of
these places later this year. However, since I'm a novice in fishing
places like this, I was wondering what sort of a rod one should use. I
have a 2wt 8' rod myself, and I will naturally find out next summer if
that is of any use in these creeks. But since it will take a couple of
months before I am able to wet my line in these streams, and since I
am an impatient man, I thought it might be interesting to hear your
opinions about this type of fishing.

In my area the best weight of the rod is probably 2 or 3, but the
length of the rod is much more of a mystery to me. I often hear
fishermen talk about 6'-7' rods, but some suggest longer rods for
dapping flies over small bushes or long grass. I've noticed that Sage,
for example, does not even produce rods shorter than 8' in their
premium SLT series in weights 0-2. I could also imagine that a shorter
rod might be useful because it would not get tangled in bushes while
fishing or moving around (I think that the shortest ones I've noticed
in my catalogues so far is a 5'6" T&T rod).

It's impossible to determine an optimal small creek rod for all types
of terrain, vegetation etc., but I'd still like to hear your
experiences. What type of rods do you use in small creeks? In
particular, how long are the rods? How does the length of the rod
limit / affect the techniques you use?

Jarmo Hurri wrote in
:


I think that is a sound piece of advice. I also just took a look at
Gierach's and Meck's books on small-stream fishing - might be a good
way to prepare during the winter.


It's a good idea to practice the casts if you can.


Steve

Stephen Welsh wrote in
. 1.4:

t's a good idea to practice the casts if you can

BTW - be careful with the bow and arrow ...

- don't hit things with the unloading rod - keep the cast up.
(like a coffee table or the floor - assuming cabin bound Jarmo)


- You can stabilise your fly hand on your head (use a dummy fly
- no pointy bits - to start out)

- You should not load the rod by pulling directly down the rod especially
with graphite rods (like high sticking). Using your head as a
stabliliser helps with this unless you have your rod hand up there
too ;-)


Steve (no I haven't done that ... ;-)

In article ,
Jarmo Hurri wrote:

In my book a creek with a width of 5 meters is already quite a river.

A 15 foot wide stream is a very small creek for the US. A creek can be
considered small and be 50 feet wide.

--
"He that would exchange liberty for temporary safety
deserves neither liberty nor safety. Ben Franklin
"Those who are ready to sacrifice freedom for security
ultimately will lose both" - Abraham Lincoln

"Steve_sullivan" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Jarmo Hurri wrote:

In my book a creek with a width of 5 meters is already quite a river.

A 15 foot wide stream is a very small creek for the US. A creek can be
considered small and be 50 feet wide.

well, now, that depends, don't it. i can think of only one piece of
wild trout water in my home state (north carolina) that is wider than about
fifty or sixty feet. most of the streams i learned to fish on were about
thirty feet wide.

when i fish the catskills, or penns, or out west (in the well-known
water of montana or colorado), i feel as if i am laying out line on the
amazon.

yfitons
wayno

"Stephen Welsh" wrote in message
.4...
"Osmo Jauhiainen" wrote in news:403121a6_1
@news.dnainternet.net:

Stones into your backpack!


Reminds me of the time we secreted a diving weight into someone
else's backpack. Hard to walk laughing like that ...

"Christ, this heavy" - lug, lug, ...

Difficult to walk laughing like that ...

;-)

Yeah, that's good. But a ham is better.

Wolfgang

On Mon, 16 Feb 2004 18:53:09 -0600, "Wolfgang"
wrote:


"Stephen Welsh" wrote in message
. 1.4...
"Osmo Jauhiainen" wrote in news:403121a6_1
@news.dnainternet.net:

Stones into your backpack!


Reminds me of the time we secreted a diving weight into someone
else's backpack. Hard to walk laughing like that ...

"Christ, this heavy" - lug, lug, ...

Difficult to walk laughing like that ...

;-)

Yeah, that's good. But a ham is better.

Wolfgang


shades of asadi . . .

Peter

turn mailhot into hotmail to reply

Visit The Streamer Page at http://www.mountaincable.net/~pcharl...ers/index.html

"Steve_sullivan" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Jarmo Hurri wrote:

In my book a creek with a width of 5 meters is already quite a river.

A 15 foot wide stream is a very small creek for the US.

Purest horse****. Many many thousands of miles of trout stream in the U.S.
are less than fifteen feet across. We've got a couple thousand miles of
such water here in Wisconsin alone.

A creek can be
considered small and be 50 feet wide.

Well, one can consider anything any way one wishes, I suppose.

Wolfgang
who has fished a lot of productive water less than five feet across.