Tidelines – May 12, 2011
I’m still not ready to sell all of my spin tackle on E-Bay yet, but I have recently renewed a growing passion for saltwater fly fishing.
Capt. Jon Huff, of Circle H Charters in Wrightsville Beach, started my fly fishing relationship last year with our season long series “The Road to Redfish.” I had never even touched a fly rod before, so Jon began our process in the parking lot of Intracoastal Angler. From there we moved to on-the-water practice, and then the article culminated in the fall with sight casting to tailing reds in the lower Cape Fear River, a trip that produced my first two redfish on the fly.
For those interested, the entire 2010 “Road to Redfish” series can be found on FishermansPost.com.
Over the past winter boat show circuit Jon and I brainstormed about what direction a series should go in 2011. Our thought was instead of building up to a certain species at the end of the year, we would try and catch as many different species as we could throughout the year (or maybe I should say as many different species as we could with our limited windows of opportunity, limited not so much by wind and weather, but rather by us being fathers and husbands and needing to work for a living).
Our 2011 started slow, as we just couldn’t find the days to go out on the Cape Fear River in February or March to target stripers, the fish we thought would start the series. Weeks passed and we felt we needed to break the ice as well as build up my confidence a little (as I hadn’t touched a fly rod since our late fall redfish trip).
So what does a beginner saltwater fly fisherman do when he needs a quick fish? Easy. He goes after snapper bluefish.
You can read all about our first saltwater fish on the fly on page 32, the most recent installment of this year’s fly fishing series, “Cape Fear on the Fly.”
Like I mentioned at starting, my interest in fly fishing (thanks to a little snapper blue) has been renewed, so I felt it appropriate to take the next step and start getting my own fly fishing gear together.
One of the joys of Fisherman’s Post is the connections I’ve made through the years, so the desire for a fly rod was an opportunity to order my first custom rod from Capt. Rick “Rod-Man” Bennett. He, too, is a regular on the boat show circuit, and every winter I’ve visited his booth wanting a good reason to walk away with a Rod-Man rod.
The wait was worth it, as my new fly rod is a beauty. It’s an 8 weight, 4-piece made from a higher end Lamiglas blank, and then outfitted with Fuji silicone carbide concept guides. Since they’re top of the line ring guides, Rick tells me, they’ll hold up a lot better in the saltwater environment.
The cork grip is hand made (Rick hand makes all his cork grips), the aluminum reel seat is double locking (so the reel’s not going to come loose even under heavy pressure), and it has a fighting butt that I can “put in my belly if I’m fighting a big fish.”
Rick’s been making rods since 1984, and he’s been making fly rods since 1995. He clearly put his talent and years of experience into my beautiful, new fly rod, and now I can’t wait to get on the water and go beat the hell out of it.
