The More Things Change..........

 "The difference between fly fishers and worm dunkers is the quality of their excuses". Anonymous

For decades and decades the hallmark of fly rod construction was seen in the beautiful, top of the line, bamboo rod. It was the rod that owners treasured and  would spend REAL money for. It was also a rod that, because of its material, was fragile.  The creators of these bamboo rods understood that and did something about it.  They offered an extra tip (tips usually break first) without additional cost. (actually the cost may have been buried in the base price but nobody seemed to care). The buyer went home with the insurance policy of an extra tip. Let's say he breaks the tip the next day.  He can still fish because he has a spare tip!

Today we have to ship the broken piece back, or the whole rod, and wait weeks or months for a replacement.  Let's do what the old timers did and sell us a rod with TWO tips. If we don't blink at a $900 price for a fly rod why not $1200 for a rod with the extra tip.  From what little poking around that I've done I've found two companies that do just that (Moonshine is one).

I've always thought that eruo rods cannot stand up to a traditional casting stroke and work best when the heavy fly is "flopped" into the water. That way the heavy fly is not flying through the atmosphere at 120 miles an hour ready to destroy any rod tip in it's path!!!

My Ankle

It's been 2.5 weeks in this cast with maybe another four weeks to go.  Thank God for fly tying BUT I want to go fishing!!

Ken