Cane wetfly rods

[overmywaders]

For years I enjoyed using a 10' Chubb 3/2 6wt wet fly rod. I eventually sold it, because I needed the money for other things, but I do miss it occasionally. I balanced the rod with a delightful early Pfleuger 1498 reel - the model with a drag that could stop a large Atlantic salmon yet also had a civilized click, not the usual Pfleuger sound of a 1950 Buick with gravel in the hubcaps.

I had replaced the 1890 vintage flip-ring guides with snake guides and rewound all the intermediate wraps. The result was a rod that could pick up twenty feet of line and throw forty feet with one backcast and little effort. Of course, the rod was so slow that I could begin the backcast, go home for lunch, and when I returned to the river there was still time for a casual cigarette before the forward cast.

In recent years due to illness, I have gone to shorter rods. This, I now understand, was a mistake. Last year I spent the first of the season with an 8' F.E. Thomas that was a medium action 5wt. Too much work. The latter part of the season I used an 8' 3/2 no-name slow-action 4wt, balanced with a heavy reel, and casting was much easier and more pleasant. Again the extreme slow action of the rod and the mass of the tip permitted me to perform better fly placement with no false-casting. It is also fun to do an upstream mend just by rolling the wrist and watch that tip swing the line over. Tip mass rules!

I might add at this juncture that most of my wet fly rods cost $50 or less. Of course, there was also usually some sweat involved in "restoring" them. TANSTAAFL Other wet fly rods were made for me in trade; so I always convince myself that those were free.

How many other forum members enjoy the easy grace of the old cane, straight-taper, wet fly rod?

Regards,
Reed

[narcodog]

On the advise of others I picked up an 8 1/2 2F Heddon no 17, Black Beauty. I found this rod a joy to fish with this past winter with a HDH silk line. I also have a pre 1928 South Bend, 8 1/2 ft, unknown model, that is about as slow as anything I have ever cast. It will roll cast and throw a couple of wets very well. It is for sale by the way.

[greenheart]

Reed, I agree with you completely. I have a 10' Divine that might be mistaken for a buggy whip, but it's very forgiving and a joy to fish. It's just one pick-up and cast. Mending is very easy, and I can hold a lot of line off the water if that's needed. I'm also partial to the look of lots of intermediate wraps. And one of the nicest things about those old, long, slow rods -- as you point out -- is the price.

[redietz]

I can't think of a better wet fly rod than a Heddon 9 foot 2F, at least until it comes to fishing upstream.

I recently had a rod made for me with the idea of upstream wets in mind. I fished it for the first time last weekend. A 7' 9" five weight, it will turn over a 14 foot leader with only five feet of line out, as well as easily casting 60 into the wind. I thought I was really going to like it until I fished it downstream. It's too short to mend line or roll cast well, and the tip is too stiff to cushion a take. I must have missed or just lightly hooked about 30 fish during a full afternoon; I only had to unhook 7. I think with the Heddon those numbers would have been reversed, and I wouldn't have had to work so hard.

(OTOH, I really do like the new rod a lot -- for dry flies.)

[overmywaders]

Oh, one more thing that the old cane limber wet fly rods could do well: pick up at the end of the drift before the fly started across the current and, without any backcast, deliver the fly directly across stream for the next drift. With a dry fly rod you would need to pick up the line, cast straight back, then turn and present it ninety degrees to the current. However, the tip of the long wet fly rod is limber and heavy, so that you can spin the tip above your head and around to the front in one fluid motion (like a whip ) without crossing the path of the line. The tip performs a 270 degree (maybe 300 degree) circuit in the air above you, the line follows the tip; but the butt never needs to go behind you as in a backcast. Great fun and saves a lot of time and energy.

I also find the cane slow action rods are superb for roll-cast pickups.

Regards,
Reed

[Mataura mayfly]

Pretty much all I use my cane rods for!
I have a few 10-12' rods of British makers. You find a lot of them here as we tended to look to the old country in the times before established tackle makers set up locally.
Most of these rods have thick yet flexable tips that are not really suited to dry fly casting and presentation, but do well with the wet flies many of them were designed for.
Most of the ones I have were basket cases when they arrived and have been rebuilt with more modern guides and tip tops allowing for thicker plastic coated lines rather than the silk they were designed for. They really test your wrapping skills if you re-do all the intermediates and some I have done spiral wraps on rather than individual intermediates every inck or so.
I am talking trade rods and not true collectors items. Some I have replaced the reel seats with those off broken graphite rods, new grips may have been added as well but the cane remains as it was at the time of making- apart from the odd reglue of delaminations.

Most of them fish a team well, roll cast beautifully and are a tireless pleasure to use as a wet fly rod fished in the fashion for which they were made.