My last 6'6" 4pc 2wt Tiger Eye

Here's the latest rod I've built. I finished it up a little over a month ago, but I'm just now getting around to posting pictures. Here are the particulars:

• 6'6" 4pc 2wt Tiger Eye blank (Sevier Mfg) in green
• H&H chrome round loop tiptop
• Alps/Forecast SF guides (one standard wire size 2, one standard wire size 1, six light wire size 1)
• Alps SF ceramic guide (size 8) as stripping guide
• Feather inlay with a single jungle cock and grey's pheasant
• Struble NS winding check
• Natural burl cork grip with burnt cork accents and rubberized cork ends
• Struble U-27 NS slide band reel seat
• Struble walnut insert, lightly sanded and then refinished with Permagloss
• Gudebrod dark green thread with metallic dark green trim
• Two or three coats of Permagloss on the thread wraps with one coat of Threadmaster Lite on top

Overall I'm pretty happy with this rod. I do like the green blank. They're not quite "perfect", but I think I did a fairly good job on the guide wraps. I started out with a few coats of Permagloss to really lock down the guides and thread wraps. I'm not sure I totally love the look Permagloss gives as it builds up so I decided to put on one thin coat of TML on top just for the glossy, smooth epoxy look. Besides, I find that Permagloss can be a bit tricky to work with here in NM due to the low humidity. There is one small wavy spot in the epoxy where the finish transitions from the feather inlay over the blank where I wrote the rod size and line weight. Maybe I'll redo the finish in that area. The inscription is on the bottom side of the rod and not shown in these pictures.

I took the CCS measurements for this blank a long time ago and it rates out as a 3wt (ERN = 3.6; AA = 62 deg). Even though the blank was sold as a 2wt, I'll be looking to throw at least a 3wt line on this one.

I should have cleaned up the blank a bit before taking the pictures. Still, I hope you like it.

A Successful Start To 2012

Better late than never, right? 

I was able to get out for a day of fishing on Friday, my first time this year. What a great day - not the best day of fishing mind you - but a day great outdoors. I'm not sure if it was due to the winter storm warning or not, but I didn't see another person out there on the river all day. Amid the solitude and off-and-on light snow showers, I managed to bring a whopping three fish to hand. I could tell that it's been a very, very long time since I've been out on the water. Knots = hard to remember. Casting = not worth mentioning. Line control = needs improvement. Hook setting = nothing special. Retrieving flies from trees = still got it!

I've been fishing my Tiger Eye 6'6" 4pc 2wt almost exclusively for the past year. However, today I decided to take out my DC Signature V 8'6" 4pc 3wt. My 3wt line is sitting on my Galvan OB-4, which is just a bit too heavy for this rod. I really like the reel so I don't mind using it.

I really like the SigV 3wt especially since it was the first rod I built, but it's not a small stream rod. I'm not sure if it's the action or the length, but I just don't feel comfortable with it in these situations. Now, get me out on a more medium to larger sized stream/river and I find it exceptionally smooth. I'll be on the look out in earnest for a new small stream 3wt late this year. I've got to finish my other rod building projects first ...

Every person I've talked to that has fished this particular river has recommended I use a prince nymph. Well, I'm still waiting to have a fish take a prince. Nevertheless, I keep trying them whenever I fish this river. I mean, every trout likes a good prince nymph, right? There are a lot of stoneflies in this river, so I figure a prince nymph will eventually work for me. In the mean time I'll keep throwing dark hare's ears and Copper John variants; they work well for me. Speaking of stoneflies, I'm hoping these are skins are leftover from last year. It'd be a shame to have missed a good stonefly hatch. The giant stonefly / salmonfly hatch normally takes place in late June or early July. I'm hoping to catch it in prime time this year. I'm expected very low water flows this year so I wouldn't be surprised if the hatch takes place in May or even April.

While wading up the river tossing the aforementioned prince nymph (with my usual lack of success), I spotted a subtle rise in a pool ahead. I stopped and watched the fish feed for about 10 minutes. It's rare that I see fish feeding off the surface on this river (except during the salmonfly hatch when they can't get enough of those big bugs). It was so great to watch that I recorded a short video of it.

There was a noticeable midge hatch going on, and I assumed this fish was feeding off the hatching flies. The best I could do to match the midges was to switch to a size 20 crippled mayfly emerger in the darkest color I had. It wasn't ideal, but I hoped it would be enough. I'll work on tying up some dark parachute adams (sz 24 or so) sometime soon; they should match a little better next time.

On my third or fourth cast, I finally managed to get my fly into position. A nose quickly appeared. My fly disappeared in a slight ripple. Fortunately I didn't botch the hook set and managed to land my first fish of 2012; a very nice brown trout. All three of the fish I caught were good sized, somewhere between 10" and 12" long.

The second fish I caught took another dry/emerger fly with an almost imperceptible take. Somehow I saw the fish move up and take the fly just beneath the surface. I need to get a new pair of polarized sunglasses. Watching your fly is so much easier without the glare. I tried to get a picture of the fish, but it managed to swim free before I could capture the image.

My third fish slammed a dark hare's ear nymph I had tied on. It fought with a vengeance and had some great color. I took a couple quick videos. Here's one just after bringing it in and another of the release.

It's much easier to take a photograph or video of a feisty fish when you've got another person with you. I'm looking forward to getting more fishing videos, especially water shots.

Oh man, did did it feel great to go fishing again. Until next time ...

E/C Caddis

I spent a few hours at the vise tying up some emerger/cripple caddis flies.  These flies are brown/tan variants of the pattern found at Charlie's Fly Box. I've been working on getting the hang of tying parachute style flies, and I'm not quite there yet, but I really, really like the way parachute's fish.  When I found this caddis pattern, I knew I needed to tie some up and try them out.  Anyways, here are the pictures ...

 

More Tiger Eye

I finally had a chance to clean up the 8'6" Tiger Eye from my previous post a bit and take a couple more pictures. I also took the rod over to the park for some test casts. I found it very smooth and comfortable to cast with a 6WF line. Casting out to 45 to 50 feet was a breeze. I've got a new 5wt line (still on the spool) that I'll try out someday as well. My only real problem with this rod is how/when to use it. I'm having trouble seeing myself using this on the small streams I like to fish. A 2wt or 3wt rod is all I've used in the last 2-1/2 years.  Let me tell you, this rod is really heavy by comparison!

I hope you like the pictures ...

Rod Build: Tiger Eye 8'6" 4pc 5/6wt

Here's my latest rod building project which I finished up this past week

-- 8'6" 4 pc 5/6wt Tiger Eye

-- REC NBS nickel silver uplocking reel seat

-- Custom turned Laos Amboyna Burl insert with CA finish

-- Burl cork grip with burnt cork trim bands in the middle and rubberized cork fore/aft ends

-- Struble nickel silver winding check
-- REC Recoil RSG stripping guides (size 12 and size 10)
-- REC Recoil RSNX snake guides (one size 2 and eight size 1 guides)

-- H&H large loop, light wire chrome tip top

-- Gudebrod sandstone thread with Gudebrod dark brown and Sulky dark copper trim wraps

Here are two pictures of the thread wraps on the butt of the rod.  I wanted to match the color and texture /pattern of the burl cork as much as possible, so I decided to use the sandstone thread.  When putting the finish epoxy on, I was able to get a bit of "marbling" in the thread saturation.  Some areas on the thread are lighter than others.  I believe most rod builders typically try to avoid this and want a nice even coloring across the thread.  This can be difficult with light colored thread over a dark blank.  However, the mottled pattern is just perfect for what I wanted.  I added the dark brown trim wraps to bring a little contrast to the rod, with the dark copper metallic thread adding some flash and matching the color of the amboyna insert.

Here you can see one of the ferrule wraps along with the first stripping guide.  I repeated the trim banding from the butt section on each of the ferrules.  The stripping guides have a single turn of the dark copper metallic thread and both ends of each wrap.  I left the wraps on the individual snake guides without any trim, just the sandstone thread.  There is a single metallic wrap at the tip top however.

Finally, just a shot of where the most of my wrapping and epoxying took place.  I've claimed the hallway bathroom as my own rod building workspace.  It's called "the fish bathroom".  It's a pretty tight fit in there with the card table, but it works.  When working on longer rod sections or making ferrule wraps (when I need to have two pieces joined together) I have to move out to the kitchen table.  Still, this is my little fly rod building domain.  The small space really heats up with the lights above the mirror and the desk lamp on.  The warmth makes the epoxy set up a bit faster, making applying the finish a bit tricky at times, but I'm working on my technique and trying to get better.

I'll have to get some more pictures of the rod.  These pictures were taken fresh of the production line so the rod needs a little clean up before it's truly ready for prime time.  I just couldn't wait much longer to post some pictures.  Until then, enjoy ...

Winter 2011 Fishing

It's been a while since I've updated the blog hasn't it -

Well, here's a quick update on 2011 so far ...

My first fishing trip of 2011 was back on January 29th.  I woke up late that Saturday morning planning on hanging out around the house.  Heidi suggested however that I get out and fish for a few hours.  I thanked her, quickly packed, told her "Thank you" once again, and headed up towards the "local" small streams, which are only about 1-1/2 hours away.

Last year I had set the goal to fish at least once a month.  Unfortunately, I fell short of my goal missing out in June and December.  I wasn’t really planning on setting the same goal this year, but if I was going to get out fishing before the end of January, well maybe I’ll give it another go in 2011.

The weather looked pretty good, but I was a little concerned about how frozen over the stream would be.  I didn’t have to worry.  Sure, there was a fair bit of snow on the ground and ice at the edges of the stream, but most of the water was open and very clear.  It was actually warm enough that I didn't have any trouble with my guides icing up.  The fish were very spooky given the crystal clear water and low winter flows.

With small black stoneflies crawling out of the water and small midges and mayflies hatching, I was able to catch my first fish on a little surface action.  An unseen rainbow shot up out of a knee deep run to take a size 20 snowshoe hare emerger.  With my first fish of 2011, we both took home souvenirs.  I managed a quick picture just before my tippet frayed and the fish took off with my hook.  Fortunately, the CDC emerger I tied on next worked just as well, bringing another rainbow and two browns to hand.

Last weekend I went back up to the same stream with a friend.  The morning started off at a brisk 23 deg when we got up to the river at 7:30.  My fingers were anything but nimble when tying my flies onto my tippet, but I was looking forward to fishing again.  I took my Tiger Eye 2wt rod once again.  I normally use a 2wt DT line, but this time I decided to try the rod out with my 3wt WF line.  Instead of respooling the line onto my 3100 reel, I left the line on my OB-4.  I really like my OB-4 reel, just not on my 6’6” 2wt rod.  Still, casting with the 3wt line was really smooth.  All the short casts I needed to make were a breeze with the heavier line, and the rod was still able to cast out to ~40 ft when I wanted.

I remembered all the small black stoneflies I had seen back in January and put a size 18 black copper john about 24 inches beneath a small dry fly.  A couple fish took the dry fly, but the copper john did most of the work that morning.  I managed to catch 8 fish with a good mixture of rainbows and brown trout.  It's been a week since this fishing trip, but I'm still pretty pumped up about that day and these beautiful fish.  I hope you enjoy the pictures.

  

Cutthroats

While up in Utah visiting family last week, I snuck off for a few hours of fishing on Thursday and Friday.  My wife will tell you it was the better part of two days, but you can decide who you want to believe.  On Thursday, I went and found a small stream, hoping to catch a few Bonneville cutthroat trout.  The first part of the stream I stopped off and tried to fish was flowing pretty fast and had a lot of cover.  Both made it difficult to fish.  Still, it was beautiful scenery and I was thankful to be out there to enjoy it.  I started out using a big dry fly and a weighted dropper to see if I could find any fish.  I fished this stretch for about an hour without any sign of success, casting wherever I could along the brushy stream.

After walking upstream around some especially thick brush, I found a nice spot to climb down the bank back to the stream.  Unfortunately, I didn't see the largest ant hill I've ever come across.  I sat down and began to slide down the bank to the water.  That's when I felt the ants start to climb all over my hand and arm.  It felt as if there were hundreds on me as I jumped the remaining distance into the middle of the stream and began stripping off my clothes and tossing them onto the opposite bank.  I'm glad no one was around to see me thrashing around half-dressed while slapping at the remaining ants crawling over my body.  I only had a few ant bites when it was finally over, but I could still feel them crawling on me for hours.  Since things weren't exactly going my way, I decided to pack up and move farther upstream.  A couple of miles further up I found a nice beaver dam.

The dam had created a small pond that looked promising.  As I carefully approached the water, I saw a couple of small trout sipping tiny insects off the surface.  I tied on a size 20 comparadun BWO and began to stalk a nearby trout.  Crawling on my hands and knees to get close enough to cast through the bushes, I finally presented an acceptable offering and was rewarded.

At first I thought I'd caught a rainbow, but the small, faint orange stripe under its jaw gave its identity away as a small cutthroat.  After a quick picture, the little cutt was off and I began untangling my line while waiting to see if another fish would begin feeding again.  This was only the second cutthroat I'd ever caught and I was anxious to catch a few more.  I spooked a nearby fish and thought I'd be done for a while, but moments later the nose of another, larger fish came into sight again and again.  By now, I had my casting figured out for this spot, so it didn't take long for me to catch my 2nd cutthroat of the day.

This was a pretty nice sized fish and it gave a good fight on my new 2wt.  I was ready for more, but the mosquitos and flies encouraged me to leave the stillwater behind and go down below the beaver dam to see what I could find in the moving water.  There was a perfect spot just below the dam holding several good sized cutthroats.  Standing behind the bushes or kneeling in the water beneath their branches provided some good cover while casting. 

I could see several fish feeding and chasing each other around in the feeding lanes.  A soft and gentle cast was all that was needed before the first one took my fly.  It was great to watch the fish see the fly and then turn and follow it downstream for a split second before taking it emphatically.

After catching a few fish on the comparadun BWO, I decided to switch out my fly for another small favorite, a size 20 Quigley Cripple.  You can see it did just as well, catching several more cutthroats.  The color on these fish was amazing.  I love the bold spots back along towards the tail.  The orange slash is definitely a highlight as well.

That little spot just below the beaver dam was a perfect place to catch some eager and beautiful fish.

A couple more came from some nice pools and pockets a bit farther downstream, too.  I had such a blast catching these awesome fish on my newest rod -- a great way to spend a few hours on the stream!

April 2010 Provo River

I found a few pictures taken while fishing on the Provo River back in April.  I had a really good time up there that day.  It was the first time I'd experienced a hatch that resulted in a lot of rising fish.  One minute the water was calm, the next it was practically boiling as the fish suddenly started to rise and take midges just under the surface.  It was a lot of fun to fish.  Of course, I spent most of the hatch pulling wind knots out of my line.  Still, I managed to catch a few on my size 20 comparadun BWO and midge flies.