The whole inspiration for this 2 wt excursion was to visit a redhorse and drum rich bend and focus mostly on those species. I’d been reveling about there recently on the 4 wt smallie fishing thing and was impressed at the sheer numbers of the non-bass species. Of course, this is a creek renown for it’s smallmouth fishing both in numbers and/or sizes depending on the year. Strong spawns in recent years have put the numbers of bass in the 10”-12” range at ridiculous levels which is quite pleasing for the flyrodder. Quite a few 14”ers considerably larger around here and they all love topwater bugs in the low water season.
So even on a sucker-centric venture, ya gotta ring
that bell a few times.
They always answer promptly…
Rockies, too!
Don’t take much, just a good SPLAT! and some legs…
Did this for awhile and was beginning to remember the original plan so I decided to take a few more popper bass and then head off for the Horsies. Not a particularly big smallmouth, mildly aggressive take, strip and tighten to the butt of the little rod and…SNAP! Yeah, that dreaded sound…
Slightly more than an hour in on a great day and it all crashes down. Recalled stories of Wulff and Kreh, their ability to cast entire flylines by hand without any rod, even catch impressive fish while proving it’s possible. Well, I believe the stories but I guarantee you neither Lee nor Lefty ever tried doing any of that crap with an UL flyline of minuscule grain weight. These heroic casting feats simply do not work down at that level. I know ‘cuz I really tried.
Started walking back trying my best to enjoy the natural beauty which remained unaltered by my personal tragedy. The rodbuilder in me, however, said “B*tch, please”, turned around and led me to a suitable workbench. Worth a shot to route a rod blank channel, seat/shim, wrap-tie with backing and see how it goes…
Ma Nature provided some decently workable hollow shim material, so I trimmed off the butt protrusion, reseated, and tied-off…
Looked good (given the situation), worked alright for a few sunfish, but I just didn’t trust the idea for anything larger so stress tested it and was rewarded with the dreaded sound yet again. Two breaks, I’m now out of rod material and I’m friggin’ done.
Got about 100 yards before thoughts of fixed line rigs, microfishing, and Tenkara started gnawing at me. Not here, not me, not in this creek. And what’s another snap anyway? Heck, seemed to be the theme of the day so reckon I just go ahead and groove with it. Third rod snap was me intentionally breaking off the reelseat portion and creating a pocketable line management device…
Threw the cork in the backpack, put reel in my left pocket, and I now have a 4’-10” sub-aught wt “stylus” and a pocket full of flyline. What can I say, too charming of a place to leave feeling all defeated and it works well enough (for what it is, anyway).
About 25’ max reach and I thought it best to stay safe and keep it small. Plenty of rightsized fish to entertain me, smallies and rock bass reliably stayed on the topwater bite and the Longears proved a more worthy adversary than ever before on the Remnant Rod. I’m convinced that there’s about a dozen variations on how a single species of Longear can look and many have slightly different attributes here and there even in the same creek. Day started at about 12:00 pm, rod broke at 1:00 pm, fished the Remnant Rod in “pocket reel & stylus” fashion until around 6:30 pm when I called it day. Hard to believe, but I’d be lying if I claimed I didn’t have a great day of fishing and a lot of fun despite the earlier tribulations.
Oh…and that bass in the first pic up there, the one in front of the midstream pyramid rock and the intact flyrod sitting on top? Yeah, just to be smartass in the face of adversity and get an enhanced sense of resolution I had to catch another bass right there when I passed by it on the way back down. Same rock much later in the day, albeit with a bit smaller bass and a bit smaller rod. Y’know, I somehow always gotta get the last word in on these kinda days...
Finishing out the day on the foreshortened rod was not only an interesting experience, but rather thought provoking for me. Probably have more to say on this and ideas that cropped-up because of it later on. Had I known earlier in the day what I learned by the end of it, I wouldn’t have wasted a second trying to repair the rod and re-seat the blank in the handle. Even if it worked, it would not have been nearly as entertaining as fishing reel-free with The Remnant.