Soft / Stiff rods ... Baja advice

Walter & Group :

 

From Phil Gay:-

 

Gordy and Troy,

 

    Excellent discussion about soft rods versus "sticks".  I have personally come full circle.  My first fly rod was a Shakespeare Wonder Rod.  I still have one.  Over the yers I progressed to more moderate action rods and eventually to the sticks.  Now in my advanced age of 65 I'm back to fishing glass in the Daimaglas rods.  My conversions started one day after fishing the Eagle River in Colorado with a stick.  I was exhausted from having to hammer that stick for every cast.  There are still applications for the sticks, but for my day to day fishing it is something soft.

 

    I have one stick, which will go nameless so as to not rustle any feathers, who's best application would be to stake up my tomatoes!

 

Phil

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Phil....

 

Back when I took my MCCI exam, I'd been practicing and fishing with very stiff rods.  I found that to do every task well, however, a medium flex rod was best.

 

I do use stiff rods for most of my salt water fishing ... but not for trout or salmon. 

 

When fishing for baby tarpon, I get great pleasure out of using a 7 1/2' custom ONE PIECE bamboo 5 wt. rod.  (Bob Sholiton made it for me, expressly to be able to stand up to the salt.  No metal ferrule, graphite reel seat, and titanium guides.)  It is  a joy to cast !

 

The stiffest rod I own remains in it's case.

 

Gordy

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From Guy Manning:

 

Gordy nad Molly,

 

Regarding Baja. I was fishing La Ventana and Cerralvo Island last year with some very talented people. The best fly was a sardina pattern 2/0 or 3/0 in black over white with eyes. CCI Jeff Priest’s JP Sardina pattern is shown here: www.garybulla.com/JPs%20Sardina.htm , Jeff and his wife were on the trip as was Gary. Black over white seemed the most productive but tan over white also took quite a few fish. The last morning it was overcast for a couple of hours and the inshore fish turned off the tan and olive sardina patterns so I went to a grey/white deceiver in 2/0 and it worked. Gary Bullas Tuna Tux also worked well in the same colors. It is on the same site as above. The flies were 3-4 inch patterns.

 

I fished an 8wt with a full intermediate bonefish taper for inshore (shallow) water then went to a 10 wt with 400 grain integrated shooting line SA for the deeper species (Yellowfin and Skippies 15 to 20 pounds) . I think this was the best way to go over heads and floaters. I believe all 8 of us were using the same full intermediate lines inshore.  The 400 grain setup on the 10 wt worked fine as long as the tuna were busting the surface but once they went down I had a hard time reaching them. I had to cast upstream into the current and feed the entire fly line out to get the line down as it came back under the boat. I didn’t do as well as my Panga mate. He was using an 11 wt with a 600 grain integrated shooting line. He hooked up with 11 tuna on the last day, out fishing all of us. The fish of the trip were Jeffs 50# bull Dorado on 15LB tippet (no bite) and Gary’s 50# Marlin taken on one of his 3/0 Tuna Tux in black. I had a “lousy” trip picking up 14 species over 6 days.

 

This year when I go I will have the 8 with the intermediate bonefish taper and sardina patterns. Two 10 wts: one with full intermediate for top water after the Dorado and Tuna with poppers, the other with the 400 grain line with the sardina patterns. I will also take a 12 wt with a 550 or 600 grain integrated head for fishing deep. There were days when the Dorado would hit the sardina and not the poppers and there were days it was the other way around, therefore the 4 setups.

 

I am also tying some 6 inch patterns for inshore. We had one incident where we got some shots at a couple 30# roosters who ignored the sardina. They were pounding black mullet and didn’t care for our little offerings.

 

Guy Manning

FFF Master Certified Casting Instructor

Moderator FFFCCI Yahoo Group

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Guy....   Same with tarpon.  Once in a while, the "poons" won't take standard or even off-standard tarpon flies.  When that happens, even with these brutes we have to, "match the hatch".

Gordy

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