“Those fish would easily break an 8wt”
- This topic has 31 replies, 17 voices, and was last updated Dec 5, 2007 at 12:38 am by
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oh shit.. ha ha.. sorry man… should have added that you ought to start w/ small one pound-ish weights and work your way up….
Normal “casting position” though? You want to be in normal “big ass fish fighting” possition… get down low on that thing.
See you did learn something though, you popped it right in the middle, which means that’s where you were applying pressure. Now when you can make one blow up at the stronger butt section of the rod you’ll know you did everything up untill that point “right”.
** I don’t want to be causing any more of ya’ll broken rods now… So if anyone else wants to try it, and I suggest you do, be patient w/ it. Some of you might not lift even a pound (and feel free to start lighter than that) off the ground for a while depending on what size rod your using… It takes practice, start w/ your heaviest rod, lightest weight, and take your time. Once you find a weight you can lift relatively easy then mess around with rod angles and see if you can find a spots where lifting it becomes easier still, increase the weight a little and repeat.
That’s rough Bob.
I can attest that this is possible with just about any weight rod. The key to heavy lifting is the realization that the movement is more akin to pulling the butt of the rod toward your stomach with a low rod angle rather than lifting upward to apply pressure. Candy caning any fly rod with this much weight is probably going to break it. You’re really using the reel and the bottom quarter of the rod to fight the fish, rather than the upper 3/4’s of the rod.
The disadvantage of this style is that you’re losing the majority of the shock absorption capabilities of the rod. You can and will break ten pound tippet on large fish if you can’t absorb shock with your elbows when the fish makes a surge or jumps.
Combine this style with an effective pulling angle and you can turn fish head over tail surprisingly easily.
Sorry about the rod.
That’s great advice from Ian who’s no doubt witnessed and tried to help correct more poor fish-fighting-form than myself.
This has probably already been said, but the easiest way to become a believer is to have someone else hold your rod in different positions while you grip the end of the line at, say, 40′.
That’s great advice from Ian who’s no doubt witnessed and tried to help correct more poor fish-fighting-form than myself. Sorry I can’t offer more of that, I just play by feel.
I’ve actually stopped teaching people how to do this. Once someone learned, fish were being brought to the boat waaaay too green.
I’ve focused on instructing use of angles rather than how hard to pull. It’s safer for me, being the one who has to handle the fish, and to prevent the fish from injuring themselves being brought in hot.
The story about the hook in the hand I referenced was caused by a hot fish that had been dealt the business by a client.
Jamie Howard demonstrated the technique Carter was talking about with a coffee can of concrete and a pulley in Chasing Silver, if I recall correctly
I’m pretty sure that’s where I picked it up from.
I’ve actually stopped teaching people how to do this. Once someone learned, fish were being brought to the boat waaaay too green.
Soooo — you are not lifting the weight with the rod, you are lifting it with the line. I can buy that explanation.
Back to my original statement, you can’t lift a 6 pound weight with the rod expecting the leader to break before the tippet does. When you point the rod at the fish, sure the tippet will break first because you are not using the rod. That’s how you break off a snag without hurting the rod. But any sizable fish will break you off with a twitch of his head if you do not have bend in the rod. There is no substitute for using a properly set drag to tire the fish with the rod bent ( sideways or up ways to keep the shock down on the tippet). The main reason we turn the rod sideways with steelhead is to turn the fish to try and keep him in front of you instead of him bolting downstream with you running after. You can break a rod just as easily that way if you have the drag set too high.
You can play a fish pointing the rod at the fish. Just pray he is nearly exausted and doesn’t plan on going aerial.
BTW we call dropping the rod on a jump as “bowing to the jump’. It gives slack so when the fish snaps his head back and forth in the jump, so he doesn’t break your rod. But you have to give him enough slack so he doesn’t break the tippet as well because there is no bend in the rod to save it.
I have caught many 10-14# steelhead on 4 and six point tippets but I am always aware if you bend into that fish, you can break that rod long before the tippet snaps. My original premise stands.
I dug around in the basement and found a spare tip for my eight weight and since I haven’t ever broken a rod on a fish (except that one time which was my fault) I probably will be okay. But I won’t tell “you know who” how it happened if I do send it back. 😉 BTW I like my 8 weight Sage much better than the Orvis.
Godspeed,
Bob
No we’re talking about lifting with the butt of the rod, not just the line.
Back to my original statement, you can’t lift a 6 pound weight with the rod expecting the leader to break before the tippet does.
Of course but I’m not seeing where you said that though. This is what I read:
Just a point for those who think the leader should break before the rod.
If you think you can put as much force on a rod as you want and the leader will always break first, try tying a 6 pound brick to the tip top of your rod and pick it up.
I can easily pop up to about 16lb tippet with a bend in the rod if I want to.
There is no substitute for using a properly set drag to tire the fish with the rod bent
We aren’t so much talking about tiring out a fish as we are talking about getting it back up to the boat after it’s pulled a lot of backing.
You don’t always fight fish, the way Ian, Zach, and myself are saying, just when you need turn them from something or pull them up out of the depths and it takes precident over absorbing more of the shocks. Being able to do this with the butt of the rod and not just the line coming off the reel (which seems to be how you are understanding us) is key, it will give you a lot more leverage and slightly better shock protection than nothing at all.
And I am sure all that works just fine for you. Wouldn’t work well for people in my area. I am standing in a 30 foot wide river with a big fish breathing in my waders. Everything I have just said works just fine for me. If you ever get a steelhead
Well I never meant to imply it was going to be the cat’s ass for fighting a steelhead in your river or a brown on light tippet (didn’t even know what you fished for untill just now) Just that it’s a proven effective method of landing large fish that’s got it’s place.
I do see what you are saying now about lifting the weight with JUST the rod.. And while it would still be theoretically possible (just have to stand on a ladder or something to get the angle on it) my reply to when the last time I’ve ever caught a brick would be when’s the last time you caught a fish without a line?
Well Carter…Actually I did catch a 10 pound salmon by hand a couple of years ago on a bet. Grabbed him by the tail with a rubber dot glove and flipped him out on the bank. I threw him right back because the DNR might take a dim view of it. And I have hooked a brick but I couldn’t land it. 🙂
We probably got off on the wrong foot. I understand and respect your method for giving large fish a “come along” especially in big water out of a boat with a ton of line out. I think it is a marvelous idea that I wouldn’t have thought of. It will probably be of use on fish such as tarpon. In fact, we use it all the time to dislodge snags across the river on the other side of an active redd or a deep hole.
My point though poorly stated was actually this. I hear all the time on other sites that you don’t ever have to worry about breaking your rod because the leader will always break first. This probably leads less experienced anglers to pull away with their new Z axis on fish, snags (salmon on the redd), or other obsticles such as other anglers, thinking all the time that their rod is not in danger. I have seen people flip their rod against a snag in younder high bush cranberry and snap it right off. That is what prompted my “brick” anology not knowing that people actually practice that technique.
So my analogy was not aimed at you or your technique. It was prompted by a common opinion held by some that their rod is invincable because the leader is so weak. You and I both know that is certainly not true.
All that being said, are we still friends?
Godspeed,
Bob
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