While we live in a world where some people curiously cheer on a White House Press Secretary

answering a reporter’s question with the Junior High retort of “your mom,” I figure I will drop a bit of

my storytelling decorum as well and talk about me a bit. More specifically, my gear and the generality

of gear in…um...general.

There is different tackle in fly fishing just like there is different tackle in all recreational fishing.

On the other side of the field, there are the spin casters, bait casters, trolling rods, and the classic

bobber and worm. When it comes to fly fishing, there are the typical fly rods, the longer and sensitive

nymphing rods, and the even longer rods for spey casting. These, however, have specific sizes within

them for different types of fishing themselves. One wouldn’t want to fish for largemouth bass with a

6’6” 3 weight fiberglass rod, and one would not want to fish small creek holes with a 9’6” 10 weight

rod. One is under-powered, the other overpowered.

When someone starts to fly fish and they tell someone at a fly shop that they are mainly

targeting trout in a river, they will most likely be led to the classic: a 9’ 5 weight rod. It has been the

gold standard of trout fly rods for decades, and for good reason. It is a rod that casts a wide net over

what you can do. It is delicate enough for presenting dry flies, long enough to euronymph (and can cast

them pretty well too), and has enough of a backbone to cast out small streamers as well.

However, if the goal is small streams here in Boundary County, one cannot choose a better rod

than a 6’6”-8” fly rod in 2-4 weight as they will be throwing small dry flies to fish who are easily

spooked and prefer a very delicate presentation. I have two go-to rods–with many others that come out

on occasion–for this type of fishing, as it is the type of fishing up here that I prefer.

First is my 6’8” S-Glass fiberglass rod from Moonlit Fly Fishing. There are mainly two types of

fiberglass used in a fly rod these days. E-Glass is the classic with its insane durability and flexibility

which makes it fun to use, but they are also very noodley. What this means is that there is a lot of

movement of the rod during casts and not a lot of backbone. They have the accuracy, but they don’t

have the power to shoot line like a graphite rod or the S-Glass variant of fiberglass fly rods. S-Glass is

lighter than E-Glass, and has a bit more strength in it in terms of casting (while still not being fully

competitive with a very fast action graphite rod).

The question someone might have when reading this is “why use something that is under-

powered while the other exists?” or “why limit yourself in terms of a fly rod?” My response would be a

simple, single word: fun. Another for me is durability, especially in the rock scrambling and slippery

creek bottom type of fishing that I like to do. I have broken a few graphite rods when I was careless and

a tip I wasn’t paying attention to snapped when it was pushed into the deep veins of a creekside

ponderosa pine. Now, I am not going to say that it is impossible to break a fiberglass rod in the same

way but I have never personally done it.

Another reason I choose fiberglass rods is the flexibility. Not only is it fun to have that surprise

14” cutthroat I found under a waterfall bend my rod to the cork but with the extra flexibility of the rod,

there is extra protection for the small 6x tippets I typically have at the end of my leader on trips like

these. And that Moonlit S-Glass that I have used and abused and landed many, many trout on, not much

is better for the style of fishing I prefer. It also is just about the funnest stick to catch bluegill on.

As for my other go-to creek rod, I have my precious Orvis 7’11” graphite Superfine Seven-

Eleven. It is a 4 wt powerhouse of a creek rod, but also just about the best rod I have ever cast. It may

be graphite, but it is a bit slower than the average graphite rod with the taper that they chose (the best

taper in the history of Orvis in my opinion). It packs more power than a fiberglass rod while casting

like a fiberglass (or bamboo!) rod. It bends well, and it handles anything from a small sunfish to a 16”

rainbow out of the Kootenai with the same finesse. The extra foot and a half it gives me over my small

fiberglass rod is great for dapping flies on the surface while also having a length that works for small

tight casts in the overgrowth. Anything within 50’, I can hit with precision with the stick and it does

pretty well with accuracy past that too. It is a rod that can fish the creek all the way up to an alpine lake

while also being strong enough to reach the middle of that alpine lake where the trout rise to the

morning mayflies.

While the Seven-Eleven is a good rod for the river, in the big Kootenai here I usually want

something with a bit more guts to it since, as we all know, it is a great big river. This is where I reach

for my Orvis 9 for 6( 9’ rod for a 6 wt line) or my Nirvana PhoenixGlass fiberglass 5 wt that is also put

out by Moonlit Fly fishing. The Orvis is a stiff flex tip that is able to shoot line far out where I need it,

and has the gusto to launch dropper rigs or small to medium sized streams with ease. The PhoenixGlass

is great for delicate presentation of dry flies, as a fiberglass rod usually is, and the S-Glass in it gives it

a good “oomph” factor for getting out some distance. But I would be lying if those were the first rods

that I reach for, or want to reach for in this situation.

If you have been reading my column for a while, you might be able to pick up that I do like my

classic tackle and that one of my prized possessions is my excellent condition pre-war Goodwin

Granger Champion 8642 (8’6” 4.2 oz) bamboo fly rod made in Colorado. The Champion was their

lower priced bamboo rod at that time, but it would be wholly unfair to lump it in with most blue-collar

bamboo rods from that time. It was a well-built workhouse with a great taper. There is a classic quote

that I will paraphrase here: Graphite is made to shoot line, bamboo is made to cast line. I can double

haul a graphite rod to shoot out more line than I already have out for the long, Hail Mary type casts, but

with the bamboo rod, I can accurately cast my line out within 50’ pretty well and just have a hell of a

lot more fun doing it. I prefer a slower action to my rods, and getting that on a nearly 100 year rod that

still holds its own with large fish gives me a satisfaction that no graphite rod will ever give me. Is it the

best tool for the job? No. Is it the best tool for the job for me? Most of the time. Is it a rod that I am

going to take on a drift boat with me as we fish the Kootenai? It won’t be the first rigged up, but it will

be there next to me for when the right time comes along. Will I use it in the autumn to swing wet flies?

Of course. Classic types of fishing demand a classic rod in my eyes. There is just a satisfaction to using

tackle that was made a decade before even my father was born. And a bonus is that it was the rod that

Reverend John Maclean used in A River Runs Through It (and in real life).

However, it would not be the rod that I would teach my wife or son to fly fish with. Bamboo

requires a whole different rhythm to it that I personally feel is a bit harder to grasp than the average

graphite fly rod or even the S-glass fiberglass rods. Every type of rod casts differently. I have cast rods

that are ~$100 dollars that I absolutely love and still take out to this day, and I have cast rods $800

dollars or more that I have absolutely despised. It all comes down to personal preference, and if you are

someone looking to get into fly fishing or a seasoned fly fisher looking for a new rod, the best advice

someone could give you is to either have someone who owns many rods that you could cast and get the

feel for what you like, or head down to a fly shop and test out rods there before you make a purchase. It

can be intimidating–I think of myself as a pretty competent caster on my own but if I am being

watched, I can look worse than I did when I was learning how to fly fish–but it is worth it so you are

not stuck with a terrible rod you had only seen pictures of online with no knowledge of how it feels in

your hands and how it works with your casting style.

All of this is my experience and my belief, and no one should dictate their life over the opinion

of another person. Fish what you like. I know spin casters who hate bait casting. I know fly fishers who

hate euronymphing (I am one of them). I know fishers who look down on a bobber and a worm but turn

around to nymph river runs with an indicator. Do what you enjoy, and never let someone tell you that

one way of doing something is better than the other. If I listened to that when I wanted to catch fish, I

would still be slinging a rooster tail up and down the county. But I would rather be casting a Hudson

Caddis along a seam and watching my fly (most of the time) while listening to the river rumble and the

birds sing. That’s fishing to me, and I know it isn’t for everyone.

And that is okay.

Do what you love, and life will be good. Do it outdoors, and it will be even better.