Some of you may have heard about, read about, or fished the John Nagy custom steelhead fly rod, designed for Great Lakes tributaries. He uses a St. Croix Wild River steelhead spinning noodle blank (model 2S106ULS2) and recommends fishing it with a 6wt. fly line. Many followers of his techniques claim it's the perfect tool for the job because it does a great job at fighting large fish on very light tippets, which is what this type of steelhead fishing requires.

Anyway, I recently bought one of these blanks and was very interested to discover that it has an ERN of 4.16 and an AA of 60. Apparently, the amount of power in this rod is more than ample, and some say ideal, for this type of fishing. I entered the data in the CCS database but figured some of you steelheaders out there would be interested enough to read the numbers here too. I haven't fished it but to me, the rod feels like you could pretty much point the butt right at the fish and just let the rod wear him out. I know that is how some people fight steelhead, which goes against everything I have ever read about proper rod use. But, I'm no steelheader so I won't pass judgement on things I don't know about. Experience fighting large fish is something else, sadly, that I don't have much of : (

I hope some of you may find this information usefull in your custom rodbuilding.

Steve

Actually, fighting the fish with the rod butt is exactly what you want to do if you want to apply the most pressure. It does require that you have the reel drag set so you don't break the fish off, of course.

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Tom, I think you misunderstood what I meant. I mean some people who steelhead fish describe literally pointing the butt cap of the rod in the fish's direction, so that the rod is completely doubled back on itself in a u-shape. I always thought that bending a rod past 90 degrees was a no-no.

They probably break a lot of rods !!! That is a No No At least to my understanding.

Pointing the butt cap directly at the fish allows it to fight until it is exhausted - makes for exciting fishing but if catch and release is observed, the fish may not survive. I have found on both Steelhead and Salmon, whether using a fly rod or spinning, by holding the rod horizontal, low to the water, and perpendicular to the fish, the upper section will point straight at the fish and it has to fight against the bend that's further down in the power section of the rod. I've read where tests were performed (I think it could have been in American Angler) that pull tests of light weight tippets against the rod in a horizontal position actually exceeded their rated strength considerably. The more time the fish spends in the water, the more time it has to find something to snag and break your tippet on. Just my 2 cents.

The longer they are fished the easyer they die ???

Steve,

Yes, I did misunderstand you. Sorry. I wouldn't do that to a rod although some rods will take that kind of abuse. I fail to see what it accomplishes, although I'm not an avis steelhead fishermen. I've caught maybe 30 in my lifetime.


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Thanks Tim and Tom for the information on fish fighting with these rods. When this rod is done, it will be used to fill the smoker, so I'm not concerned about fish survival, just getting them successfully to the net. My initial thought when I got my hands on this blank was, man, this thing does not have that much power considering it's designed for a 10-15 lb. fish that can really scream. But, I guess that protecting very light tippets and preventing break-off at the strike are the strong suits of the "noodle" blank design. It's an interesting rod. It does not feel to me like any blank I have ever had. It does not, for example, just feel like a long fly rod. I can't really put my finger on how it's different, but it does feel different. Unless I had specifically heard so many great things reported about this specific blank for this specific purpose, it is not a blank I would have naturally selected for the job. My Rainshadow IF1067 (7.53/65) seems more up to the task, at least in terms of power.

The 1141G Loomis rods that have been around so long are just a 7 weight fly rod blank. The IMX and the GLX versions however are a faster actioned blank than the originals.