[karsten neben]

Thanks Simon,

My friend has been and gone, had a fantastic trip, the flies seemed to work well for him. I tied a bunch of different variants with thread bodies overbound with transparent stretch tube. One I paticularly liked was tan thread, clear ST a very sparse wing of HiVis and black eyeballs. The HiVis wing has a nice amount of flash without being over the top.

Thanks for the advice I’ll try snipping the wing down. Its Hard to tell in the pics but all of the flies have a 4-6 strand krystal flash underwing. Would you tie the flash on top of the wing?

What hooks do you recommend especially in the smaller sizes. The varivas were fine in the 4s but some of the 6s bent straight. One of the guys was using a Gamakatsu B10S which seemed to fare better. It’s a finer hook and I think must give better penetration which would make it less likely to straighten. I’d love to hear your thoughts?

Cheers
Karsten

[karsten neben]

Thought I’d contribute some of my snaps.

South Island NZ somewher in Otago?

South Island NZ Nelson

Same River

South Island NZ Nelson

South Island NZ upper Mataura

[karsten neben]

Hi Tim,

After letting you know I stressed all his hooks you’re still keen to put in an order?

[karsten neben]

Cool

[karsten neben]

Hi Tim,
Nice pictorial, I thoroughly enjoyed it, you sure got to prospect some good looking water.

You left yourself wide open for a dig mate, so I am sorry in advance for capitalising on the opportunity 😛

4 days, 3 fisherman, countless miles, 5 total hookups, 2 total fish to hand. Suffered through a hangover or two and made do with what the weather threw at us!

Toughen up lads, grow some hair on your chest and take the short cut next time (joking)  😉

I think your doing pretty well on the DSLR front and the fishing even if you did lose the big one this time.

[karsten neben]

Good luck with the hunt for your 10 footer Callum.
I’ve been interested in a Tenkara rod for a while, how do you find it?

I also dabble in making bamboo rods, didn’t make it to the last southern highlands meet. Hope to make it to the next one if there is one.

Karsten

[karsten neben]

Hi Callum,

Sp+ now there’s a broomstick contrast to livefibre rods if ever I heard one

[karsten neben]

Hi John,

It’s hard to compare the Bukie to a boronIIx especially the 6wt. I tried to like the 6wt BIIx for a NZ rod but never understood why it was such a different beast to th 3, 4, 5 and 7wt? I think you’re right it’s more like a 5wt but the true 5wt in my eyes is a much nicer rod. The 5wt is lovely and the 7wt one of the nicest rods I’ve ever owned, it’s the pick of the BIIx’s for me.

I should point out I made a mistake in my last post, my mate has a 6wt BoronII-MX which he prefers over the 6wt Burkie. He is a more aggressive caster and wanted a fast rod for punching heavily weighted flies into the wind. I prefered the Burkie, it had far more finesse took less energy to cast and performed well in the wind.

For your application I’d be getting in touch with Kerry and talking to him about your needs, follow it up with an email. He has so many tapers on hand and might tweak the rod slightly for your needs and application. I have no hesitation in recommending the 5wt for what you require and wouldn’t dare compare it to your 6wtBIIx it wouldn’t be fair to the Burkie. Be prepared to wait, 3months turned into 6 for me but I didn’t mind, if the wait is a problem you can always buy the standard rods off the shelf like my friend did.

If I had to compare the 6wt to the 5wt in the Burkie I would say the 5wt is definately a more versatile rod/allrounder. The 5wt has a lot of feel and is more tip responsive than the 6wt. The 6wt in comparison is a bit of a cannon when you get your timing right, less finesse and dampens the feeling of what’s going on a bit compared to the 5wt. I think the 6wt is still a nice rod but a different beast to the 5wt.

I hope this helps and doesn’t confuse you more? The best advise is talk to the man himself.

My best

Karsten

Forgott to mention the blank is Blue.

[karsten neben]

Hi John,

I love Burkheimers rods. Got a vintage 9′ 5wt made for my wife a while back. It’s the nicest 5wt I’ve ever cast (each to their own) and I’ve cast quite a few other rods in my time. My best friend used to manage a tackle store.  😉

If I had to describe the action I would say medium+ in a progressive taper. It’s a rod that is pin point accurate doesn’t take a lot to drive and puts a smile on your dial when you reach for distance. I got my wifes rod made for sight fishing to large browns in the Sth Island NZ and lake polaroiding in Tassy. After much correspondence I know Kerry listened because the rod ticked all the right boxes and then some.

My friend has a 5wt and 6wt, I fished the 6wt in Tassy a few months back and loved it. My friend however prefers his Winston boron IIx for his applications. I am selling his 6wt on ebay soon I haven’t checked with him but think he mentioned $300US as a list price. If your interested send me a PM and I’ll keep you informed.

[karsten neben]

Hi Dusty, CF stands for compact fluroescent. It doesn’t matter what kind of lamps you use. What is really important is that they are all the same colour temperature.
Most digital camera’s let you set the white balance manually or usually the auto setting does a pretty good job for you. Make sure you turn off any additional overhead lights or lighting in the room, they’re bound to have conflicting colour temperatures and will give you an unnatural cast. Hope this helps?

Thanks for the link JT, looks like great material and a neat technique. The fuzzle technique is a a bit different but I see what you mean, especially with the leech pattern.

[karsten neben]

Thanks for the welcome guys, glad you like the patterns/photo’s.

Clark –  No hard feelings mate, I wasn’t trying to be negative either, just thought I might have offended you by not mentioning Mr Morse. The man does catch a hell of alot of fish!

Dusty – I don’t know about Mastery, my set up is embarrassingly simple. :-[

Backdrop = Colour Sheet of cardboard
Lighting = 3 cheap CF lamps (Same bulbs 4000k). 1 is my tying/desklamp the other 2 are the clip on type (I clip these to my tying desk when I need them.
Diffuse the light by attaching crinkled up tracing paper to the lamps with elastic bands (I keep these on).

Tripod  + small compact camera, set to macro with adjusted exposure where necessary.

If you have any questions/want more info or a pic feel free to send me a PM?

[karsten neben]

Hi Clark,

Thanks for the welcome, glad you like the flies.

You’re right about Morsie and that Muz would tell me himself, a matter of fact I am sure he has at some point.

I didn’t mean to offend anyone, just to introduce myself and post a few flies. I always credit the pattern to it’s rightful owner and these ones happen to belong to Murray.

If anyone is interested in delving deeper here’s a link to an old post on this site and to a flylife article about the technique and how it started. http://www.itinerantangler.com/cgi-bin/board/YaBB.pl?num=1200783692/0

http://www.flylife.com.au/library/articles/40/40.html

[karsten neben]

Hi Neal,

Thanks for the welcome, Muz won’t mind.

I’ll make a small vid and post it when I find the time.

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