Well ,I tested the new 15 foot 'wafting ' rod yesterday and was pleasantly surprised. Mid Winter in a boat, 2degC, 40' crystal clear water. Not stocked for a while.
Other members using the mandatary sinking lines of varying sink rates. I didn't think I had a chance of catching anything on the floater, but hey, I'm just checking the rod out with various line weights and profiles. The rod is more through action than the current model. Pleasingly smooth but just as powerful, which was surprising bearing in mind that the thick end of the blank is only 11.5mm compared with 17mm on the Harrison. I tried 6 lines ranging from 3 to 5 weight, all set up with my usual two fly reservoir rig which has a dropper at 5' and a heavy point fly a further 10' below.
All the lines worked to a certain degree but the 3 weight Smallstream was the best. I actually caught 5 averaging over 3lb and lost 2, so the fish playing properties were tested too - no problem. A Dogs nobbler on the point of a 15' leader, using a 3 weight line is not the usual thing to do but the 15' rod made it easy and the heavy fly landed quite neatly. Once settled on the smallstream #3, I changed to nymphs for the final 2 fish. My four mates that were there did not do very well. 2, 1, nil, nil. Oh! I had the warmest hands too. No handling wet lines for me
