Hmm...well if you say you can pull in 20" fish on a 5wt line then I guess thats what I'll go for. I guess I was more concerned about the leader and tippit seeing as how thin they are for the fly how they can withstand the force of a 20" fish pulling at it.
New Fly Fisherman
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the "weight" rating of the rod and line dont have much to do with the size of the fish just what and how far you can cast for biger fish just up your tippet but even a 6x tippet is around 2# test and you can land some big fish on that remember the long flexable flyrod really helps is landing the fish if your going to key on the trout and not planning on tossing poppers for bass and pan fish you might consider a 4wt and maybe only 7 1/2 ft and i promise you will be ble to cast farther than you could see a size 18 coachman drifting on the surface unless you got bionic eyes
WARNING two cents follows WARNING
I have four rods3, 5, 7, and 9 weights. I use the 5-weight 90% of the time and have caught fish to 12 lbs on it. I've also (not purposely) landed about a 30 lb carp on teh three weight.
The 3, an Orivis Rocky Mountain with Battenkill reel and orvis DT line I purchase on E-bay for $75. It may be worth casting a few rods at some of the great fly shops around and then checking e-bay for deals if your under the gun for cash.
The 9 is a Redington outfit which I bought from teh Redington website, line reel and all, it was also less than $200. the action is a little slower (meaning that the rod has a little less backbone or stiffness) than I like but it still fishes great.
Finally, Temple Fork Outfitters makes some great rods, introductory and otherwise at very reasonable prices ($50 to 200). I've cast with several weights and lengths and I think these are as good as any Sage I've ever had. The only reason I don't buy one is because I really don't need it...ok maybe I'll get one for Christmas.
Above all else, have a good time out there and laugh when you hang a tree or yourself, especially if noone's watching. It's fun dammit. It's supposed to be fun.
I have four rods3, 5, 7, and 9 weights. I use the 5-weight 90% of the time and have caught fish to 12 lbs on it. I've also (not purposely) landed about a 30 lb carp on teh three weight.
The 3, an Orivis Rocky Mountain with Battenkill reel and orvis DT line I purchase on E-bay for $75. It may be worth casting a few rods at some of the great fly shops around and then checking e-bay for deals if your under the gun for cash.
The 9 is a Redington outfit which I bought from teh Redington website, line reel and all, it was also less than $200. the action is a little slower (meaning that the rod has a little less backbone or stiffness) than I like but it still fishes great.
Finally, Temple Fork Outfitters makes some great rods, introductory and otherwise at very reasonable prices ($50 to 200). I've cast with several weights and lengths and I think these are as good as any Sage I've ever had. The only reason I don't buy one is because I really don't need it...ok maybe I'll get one for Christmas.
Above all else, have a good time out there and laugh when you hang a tree or yourself, especially if noone's watching. It's fun dammit. It's supposed to be fun.
Joined
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665 Posts
after learning to flyfish this summer and being consistantly succesful I will give my 2 cents:
I have a Cortland GRX fly rod which I found at a 50% off sale (It listed for $80) so I got it for $40. A decent, name-brand rod that's a step up from the wal-mart package stuff, even if you have to pay full price for it. I also bought a Okuma Sierra 5/6 reel at Jax in Fort Collins for $35. Beautiful reel for the money...good drag, nice construction. Gets the job done and will last forever.
I just have the one 5/6 weight rod with WF5F line and I typically use a 5x leader/ tippet for trout in the poudre river...It seems to work great.
I am very anti-snob so I WILL go out of my way to ruffle the eyebrows of the uptight elitist fly fisherman who think that trout are somehow supernatural creatures that can reason and write PHD papers on fly presentation.
Keep it simple and have fun...There's a guy I work with who is kind of a snobby type and he was telling my how I was casting all wrong...I will listen to his advice and perhaps try to take it to heart, but I also know that even with my 'wrong' casting, I catch more fish than he does.
as far as playing the fish...yes, the tippet can break and it is very different from spinfishing. that's the biggest thing to get used to. You have to play the fish quite a bit differently with a fly rod, there is some very good advice on this forum. for more info on this subject look at a thread called "playing fish quickly" where I asked similar questions earlier this summer.
good luck.
I have a Cortland GRX fly rod which I found at a 50% off sale (It listed for $80) so I got it for $40. A decent, name-brand rod that's a step up from the wal-mart package stuff, even if you have to pay full price for it. I also bought a Okuma Sierra 5/6 reel at Jax in Fort Collins for $35. Beautiful reel for the money...good drag, nice construction. Gets the job done and will last forever.
I just have the one 5/6 weight rod with WF5F line and I typically use a 5x leader/ tippet for trout in the poudre river...It seems to work great.
I am very anti-snob so I WILL go out of my way to ruffle the eyebrows of the uptight elitist fly fisherman who think that trout are somehow supernatural creatures that can reason and write PHD papers on fly presentation.
Keep it simple and have fun...There's a guy I work with who is kind of a snobby type and he was telling my how I was casting all wrong...I will listen to his advice and perhaps try to take it to heart, but I also know that even with my 'wrong' casting, I catch more fish than he does.
as far as playing the fish...yes, the tippet can break and it is very different from spinfishing. that's the biggest thing to get used to. You have to play the fish quite a bit differently with a fly rod, there is some very good advice on this forum. for more info on this subject look at a thread called "playing fish quickly" where I asked similar questions earlier this summer.
good luck.
Thanks for all of the advice guys. Went looking at Sportsman's Warehouse today for some rods or rod/reel combos just to get an idea of what there is. I saw in the last post that Cortland seems to be a good brand, but what about their combos? The ones we saw were $89 for rod, reel, backing, line, leader, tippit, and a video. I guess thats a little inexpensive for all of that. I'm pretty sure I want to go with a slower action rod since the one I have been using is a real fast "finesse" rod and it just makes it so hard to cast for some reason, might also be the case that the rod is a 6wt and the line looks to little to be that big, seems more of 3 or 4 wt line. Is there really any good way to tell the stiffness of a rod besides going to a store and feeling it? I've noticed very few sites online tell you what the action of the rod is and it seems the less expensive I go the faster the action is and just doesn't seem to be what I'm looking for.
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3,175 Posts
I think your best bet is to try it out. Just like any other thing in advertising, one company's size 10 shoe is like another's 9 1/2Derajaman said:
You'll get to know a lot more than just the fast/slow response of the rod, such as how well it is balanced, etc. When I was looking at fly rods a while back (3 yrs ago?), I'm pretty sure that the faster rods were more expensive, so that's interesting if things have flip flopped.21 - 26 of 26 Posts
