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Decided I'm Going Purist...

Spey 
6K views 45 replies 22 participants last post by  fredaevans 
#1 ·
No more two handed rods - they are new fangled fads only accepted in the mid 70's. If you're a real purist then it's a silk line on a single hander damnit.
 
#2 ·
Pot Stirrer! Two handed rods have been around longer than you are willing to acknowlege. 70's you say? 70's of what century?

Fish however you wish, be it broad based in gear, scope and methods; or narrow. We likely all define purist differently. Will your silk lines be on click pawl reels and rods made of natural materials free of modern age carbons, graphites, fiberglass and resins?

I think you are just bored and trying to poke the bear.
 
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#7 ·
Jesse,

Purist is gonna' cost ya'. A purist uses only rods made of split bamboo, reels made in England, silk line, gut leader, and flies tied with natural materials only. Oh, and you'll need to wear a houndstooth tweed fishing jacket.

And while I knew of one local steelheader packing a two handed rod in 1976, they didn't become popular until the very late 1980s and early 1990s. Many, I dare say, more steelhead were caught on single hand rods if for no other reason than that there were so many more steelhead around to be caught. Take the NF Stilly for example; from July 4th on there would be 40 or more, usually more, summer runs in Fortson Hole and 60 or more in Skiers. And those numbers would hold through the summer and into the fall with new fish arriving as anglers caught and removed them. More steelhead caught on 8 1/2' FF85 Fenwick fiberglass rods and Pflueger Medalist reels than all else combined since Spey rods showed up. Which is why it's hard not to laugh when a newbie inquires if he buys a $400+ high end reel with a drag that will stop a VW, will he have enough reel for steelhead fishing.

Sg
 
#10 ·
Jesse,

Purist is gonna' cost ya'. A purist uses only rods made of split bamboo, reels made in England, silk line, gut leader, and flies tied with natural materials only. Oh, and you'll need to wear a houndstooth tweed fishing jacket.

And while I knew of one local steelheader packing a two handed rod in 1976, they didn't become popular until the very late 1980s and early 1990s. Many, I dare say, more steelhead were caught on single hand rods if for no other reason than that there were so many more steelhead around to be caught. Take the NF Stilly for example; from July 4th on there would be 40 or more, usually more, summer runs in Fortson Hole and 60 or more in Skiers. And those numbers would hold through the summer and into the fall with new fish arriving as anglers caught and removed them. More steelhead caught on 8 1/2' FF85 Fenwick fiberglass rods and Pflueger Medalist reels than all else combined since Spey rods showed up. Which is why it's hard not to laugh when a newbie inquires if he buys a $400+ high end reel with a drag that will stop a VW, will he have enough reel for steelhead fishing.

Sg
Thanks - I think I'm just going to use the houdstooth tweed jacket. Perhaps the world will implode upon itself when I slip my much beloved thingamabobber into the inside pocket.

I can't wait to tell my kids about the "good old days" when I caught 6 steelhead in one day..... they will think I'm bat shit crazy..... chasing a probable 1 fish a season.
 
G
#11 ·
purist don't use vices to tie...If you want to see truely amazing...watch the old hardy tyers etc. all was done while holding the fly in hand...How the hell they could do that I have no idea..and these were classic i.e. jock scott flies which I can't tie with a vice or three hands....

Spey rods have been around for a long time...check your scottish history....Modern spey rods i.e. graphite...about as long as modern single hands...materials change, rods follow...

Hell hasn't Ed been trying to pawn an old boo spey for awhile?
 
#12 ·
purist don't use vices to tie...If you want to see truely amazing...watch the old hardy tyers etc. all was done while holding the fly in hand...How the hell they could do that I have no idea..and these were classic i.e. jock scott flies which I can't tie with a vice or three hands....

Spey rods have been around for a long time...check your scottish history....Modern spey rods i.e. graphite...about as long as modern single hands...materials change, rods follow...

Hell hasn't Ed been trying to pawn an old boo spey for awhile?
Touche...i'm working my way up to tying in hand....a dying art form, no doubt about it.
 
#14 ·
One interesting tid bit you'll find as you get farther in to A Passion for Steelhead is that (much paraphrasing here) is that Ed Ward coined the term "Skagit Casting" because they were not using traditional "Spey Casting" techniques while fishing on the Skagit river for Steelhead using two-handed fly rods and that as a group they were not "Spey Casting" so much as "Skagit Casting". So the pot stirring is kind of amusing to me on the basis of the word traditional.

Another interesting tid bit is that getting a hold of a two handed rod, pre-maid or just a blank, was very difficult until the 90's and even then there were not a whole lot of choices. So it's hard to get any sort of tradition when there is very little availablity. Here's a quote from Mike Kinney in an interview with Dana Sturn on his first two handed rod set up:

Dana: What got you started with the two-handed rod?

Mike: I started flyfishing on the Stillaguamish with single handers and whenever the rod companies came out with longer single handed rods I liked them better. I started reading about the two-handed rods coming out of England and got interested in them. Then I heard that Sage was going to be making some of these rods so I asked for some of the first ones. In those early years they didn't even make rods, they were just blanks. I knew Les Icorn, the Sage rep in the Northwest at the time. I met him at a local fishing shop and got my first blanks through him.
URL to the entire interview: http://speypages.com/kinney.html

As for my two handed rig, it is about as traditional as not being traditional because the main point of what I'm doing is lifting heavy sink tips and large to really big ass files and sending them for a ride (Skagit Casting) with out tearing up my shoulder.

As far as I go with tradition, I appreciate it and think it is great but I like to build on the ground work that tradition has laid and move forward. Keep reading A Passion for Steelhead it's one of the best books on the subject in print, which is why I got my signed copy when Dec made the offer about three months ago to or so.

Oh and have fun greasing your silk line when you want it to float or how your wool coat itches in the cold and rain :D
 
#15 ·
Hi All.
Now stop it....... Speycasting history being my thing, rods that came out of England....... thats like me saying American football came out of Canada ........ or maybe it did. :D
Speycasting has changed since the first Double hander was built in the 1840's and will always get a new name or casting style, Underhand casting...... Scotland 1890's while they were still bait fishing in norway, Switch rod........ 1880's,
Nowadays its easy to make a silk line float.......... car bumper polish, makes almost anything float. and a good Ghillie's Tweed Jacket is 100% waterproff (Harris Tweed), better than most of the new ones i have bought.
Cheers Gordon.
 
G
#17 ·
Yeah but Gordon...a good Harris tweed jacket would make these guys think Simms was cheap...hmmm maybe a Simms tweed wading jacket..

Oh the howls.....LoL...

Oh and for the record...I love them and tweed hats and own a few of the hats...but for some reason when I wear one of them is causes great comic relief for my buds...asshats that they are...hell even my kids make me take them off...and it IS in my blood too...
(maybe a sherlock holmes one? hmmm)
 
#21 ·
William scrope wrote in the days before waders,
Avoid standing upon rocking stones, for obvious reasons; and never go into the water deeper than the fifth button of your waistcoat: even this does not agree with tender constitutions in frosty weather. As you are likely not to take a just estimate of the cold in the excitement of the sport, should you be of a delicate temperament, and be wading in the month of February, when it may chance to freeze very hard, examine your legs. Should they be black, or even purple, it might, perhaps, be as well to get on dry land; but if they are only rubicund, you may continue to enjoy the water, if it so pleases you.
Gordon
 
G
#31 ·
you tend to bust your knuckles on big fish luke..i.e. why they are called "knucklbusters" For nookies I did damage to my hands..wasn't that fun...

I can honestly tell you guys from my own experience that pin's are a bit more chanllenging in the beginning...but like any gear I have fished it really got B O R I N G for me...your still watching a float all day..

When I started with the single hand and then moved on to the spey...even slow days are still fun because there is just that much more to learn and do...whether it's finding the fish and finding what they eating...or being surprised by catching one when all you've heard is "it can't be done in these conditions, with a fly etc. etc."
 

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#32 ·
Awesome golfman - that's what it's all about. I spent a lot of time fishing for those guys this season but don't think I ever had one on the line. A couple winter fish took my fly - but not spring dingers- I'm just really getting into the Spey scene as it is. I would love to get one on the swing though. Some day.

I had a gear trip last winter where we went 5 for 6 on steelhead. At the end of the day I still felt unfulfilled. I was happy. But, not as happy as the days I got 1 fish on the swing. That is asinine to some and understood by a brotherhood of others.
 
G
#35 ·
you hit it on the head Jesse ..there is a brotherhood that understands that...
I don't know what or why it happens? For me, I loved hanging out with my buds fishing gear with pins etc. then I watched a guy fly fishing...then I got hooked on it...kept thinking I would use my gear again..first year or two I would bring it out here and there....then it just became more of a challenge to do it with the fly...and i caught a lot less fish then and probably still don't to some extent....

I know guys have done well with single hand rods and oddly enough, very small flies that they cast into the deep pools, let sink and then strip in....have seen quite a few springers caught that way...I have only gotten one on the swing and it was on a floating line and white fly....I saw him rolling his way up river, cast to put the fly right in front of him and he took it...snapped my 8lb tippet pretty quick but I was really fishing for bulls so it surprised the hell out of me..

The longer i've been doing this the less I like using heavy tips and flies....learning to "work" your fly takes time and sometimes a few pointers from guys with the knowledge....I just take no joy in hucking big junk down when there are other methods that will work with some patience, some skill and some luck...
 
#36 ·
you hit it on the head Jesse ..there is a brotherhood that understands that...

The longer i've been doing this the less I like using heavy tips and flies....learning to "work" your fly takes time and sometimes a few pointers from guys with the knowledge....I just take no joy in hucking big junk down when there are other methods that will work with some patience, some skill and some luck...
I agree with golfman. To me winter fishing with tips and large flies is just a way to pass the winter away. Give me floating line with a sz. 7 Blue charm or muddler, riffle hitched on a summer evening. Something about seeing a fish roll on your fly!
 
#37 ·
While I'd rather fish a floating line any day for the pure simplicity of it, I equally enjoy fishing deep, altho I forego the T-14 and mainly use my 8 wt type 3 and 6 tips. Hell back in the single hand days, I didn't know I was at a loss using 15' high speed, Hi-D tips I made myself. It was the best stuff going that I knew of, and a little watermanship got the fly in front of the fish on a regular basis.

Still, if you insist on going purist, I maintain my case that you're restricted to silk and gut, etc.

Sg
 
#38 ·
I bought a handmade leader wallet at an estate sale awhile back. It is filled with old pre tied steelhead leaders made from some material I've never seen before, I'll sell you them for the sake of purity at $100 a piece. He was known to haunt the stilly it's like a piece of history on every cast. Pair it with a prewar perfect and a fenwick glass and you're stylin son. But I'll follow you with the Tcx, t8, compact skagit and the shoreline special :)
 
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