As I prepare for an upcoming saltwater journey, I’ve been enduring the challenges most right-brained thinkers take care of in relation to group and preparation. For me, it typically begins with unpacking my duffle from my final massive journey. Meaning I’ve a number of notable organizational obstacles. First, I must take away every thing “trouty” from my bag. Sure, I’m a procrastinator — I’ve embraced this trait and have come to grips with the truth that I are inclined to work finest briefly bursts and on a deadline. It is probably not the perfect trait for a busy freelance author, however all of us discover the groove in our work types and do our greatest to punch by means of no matter will get in our method.
As soon as I’ve eliminated every thing trout associated, from wading boots to 3x tippet, the hunt begins for saltwater reels with saltwater traces, and saltwater rods which were tucked away for months, presumably within the appropriately labeled rod tube (however simply as doubtless stuffed into the primary empty tube I encountered the final time I unpacked. Don’t choose. I do know my faults all too properly.
However this journey has me feeling a bit completely different about my strategy to all issues salty. Positive, I wish to catch massive Cuban bones and perhaps tangle with a allow, however I additionally detest the thought of standing atop the casting platform whereas attempting out the most recent and quickest saltwater rods which are flying off main producers’ mandrels today. I’m toying with the thought of going sluggish.
How sluggish? Like, fiberglass sluggish. Gentle, supple rods that’ll decelerate my solid and, ought to I be fortunate sufficient, actually improve a struggle with a bonefish.
Don’t scoff. Glass is a fuel, bruh.
And at the moment’s glass rods are nothing to sneeze at. A handful of producers, some massive, some extra obscure, are crafting glass rods with that good, tender really feel and the power to frivolously “plop” a bead-eyed Loopy Charlie on a dime whereas nonetheless having the spine to battle saltwater fish.
When Kirk Deeter and I wrote The Little Black Guide of Fly Fishing just a few years again, I included a brief missive noting that quicker rods aren’t all the time higher. I stand by that, though, in that excerpt, I maintained {that a} quicker rod is probably going a more sensible choice for studios fishing. Reality be advised, given the very actual probability of wind and the necessity for lengthy casts, a double haul and spot-on casts completed in a rush, that assertion might be extra true than not.
But it surely’s not totally true. Who among the many flats-fishing group hasn’t dropped a Gotcha on the nostril of a cruising bone with the delicacy of Prince Humperdink’s brute squad? How briskly did that good bonefish disappear in a muddy cloud? On the flats, significantly in tight quarters, somewhat grace goes a good distance. And a slower rod is conducive to extra considerate, extra purposeful and, sure, extra delicate shows.
One of many challenges anglers face when fishing glass is that it takes some time to regulate to the implement. It’s a rod for really feel, not for power; contact, not for torque. And after we say a rod is “sluggish,” what we’re actually saying is that we must decelerate. Slower, softer rods have a deeper bend level, a lot nearer to the center and even the grip of the implement. Meaning it takes a slower rod longer to load and longer to solid. It doesn’t imply it received’t solid properly, or solid far — that’s a false impression.
I’m going to pack a glass rod in my duffle for this journey. I could or might not use it, however I hope a peaceful day comes about, perhaps whereas I’m wading some beautiful white-sand flat and spy a trio of ghostly bones crossing my field of regard. And I could blow the shot — and I’ve blown a whole bunch of photographs. However I’m within the temper for sluggish. Hell, today, I’m sluggish. It is probably not the wisest selection, however I’m past caring about numbers and dimension. As a substitute, if I get fortunate and I make an extended, tender solid and idiot a bonefish, I’ll get to really feel that fish because it turns and programs off into the horizon, like solely a bonefish does.
I wish to see the bend within the rod and really feel each swipe of that angled tail because it cuts by means of the clear, Caribbean water. I’d like to do all that. Simply as soon as.
Then, perhaps, I’ll swap again to one of many brand-new composite rods that weighs subsequent to nothing and may magically carry 40 ft of line off the water with the flick of a wrist. Don’t suppose I don’t recognize that. I do. However then, perhaps I’ll stick to that slower rod and preserve the tweak I needed to make in my very own head that needed to occur once I loaded it into the boat to start with.
No, quicker isn’t all the time higher. And higher doesn’t all the time imply quicker, both. Decelerate at times. As a well known teen from the ‘burbs of Chicago would possibly say, “Life strikes fairly quick. When you don’t cease and go searching on occasion, you might miss it.”
Possibly it simply takes a right-brained procrastinator to determine that out.
