bamboo

With the river muddy from last nights rain it seemed like a good time to hit a pond. I decided to air out one of the old fly rods. A Montague Rapidan made sometime in the 1940's. The Rapidan is famous as "the poor man's bamboo". It casts well but doesn't have the sticker shock that puts bamboo out of reach of guys like me. Montague made rods of all price ranges and the cheaper models frankly just don't perform all that well. The Rapidan is the exception. Even some of the guys that can afford the Phillipsons and Paynes that cost more than my old truck have a Rapidan that they take fishing while there expensive wood stays safe in the display case. The average decent Rapidan is valued somewhere between $150 and $200. Mine was an E-bay find years ago that was less than half that. But it's in perfect shape even down to having the original tube, original labels and hardware and an extra tip.


I tied on a sponge spider to start and caught a few small bass in the ten inch range and some ok sized bluegill. But I knew this pond had some big bluegill so I began to tinker. I tied on a beadhead nymph with some gold wire.



It sank fast and provided a bit of flash in the clear water of the pond. That was the ticket. I began to hook up much more frequently. Even the small bass were nailing the little size beadhead. Having grew up on fast action graphite fly rods I had to keep reminding myself to slow down. I'd catch little shock waves rolling down my loop as I cast. When I'd take a long breath and relax the rod cast beautifully. Not a distance cannon like my modern fast action rods but very serviceable at reasonable fishing distances. Then a slow retrieve and the slower the better. Almost every good cast and retrieve then began to pay off. The line would stop or just imperceptibly twitch backward and I'd raise the rod into a fish. Really pretty gills too in the 7 to 8 inch range.



I began to tinker again since the fish were biting so well it was easy to tell what worked and what didn't. Well the ticket turned out to be a big beadhead nymph. More of a smallmouth or trout pattern. But it weeded out the smaller gills while the action was still fast and furious.



Again the slower the better on the retrieve. But now the gills averaged more like 8 to 9 inches long.




It was a fine time. I also took a loop thru a nearby woods hoping to find a few late morels. No such luck but I did find a beautiful little wild orchid and several ginseng plants. It's amazing how fast the woods is changing now. It seemingly looks different every day this time of year.




Bamboo, on the other hand, sets me calm and quiet, and I find that if I "feel" the rod and almost go along with what it wants to do with the particular rig that I have attached to the line at the moment, my efforts are more than rewarded."
from "Tactics on Trout" by Ray Ovington 1969