I've just been given the task of building a couple of fishing rods for my pastor's grand daughters. They are ages 5 and 3. My pastor wants the rods to be short. I'm guessing no more than 4'. He wants one in pink the other in purple. Since they are kids and this would probably be their first time fishing, I am going to need something that can stand up to sunfish, a 3 year old and a 5 year old. Where can I find blanks that I can work with...without cutting? These will be spincasters.
Thanks

Mudhole Custom Builder blanks come in pink and purple. [www.mudhole.com] They are nice blanks and a great price. Skortest they com in is 5'6" For kids that age, I wouldn't hesitate to whack off a foot from the butt

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/05/2010 07:38PM by Mike Barkley.

I'll second Mike's suggestion. I built them for three of my grandkids.

Here's the pink & purple [www.rodbuilding.org]

Chuck

_________________________________________
"Angling is extremely time consuming.
That's sort of the whole point." - Thomas McGuane

I built some of the Mudhole blanks (5'6") for my kids, when they were ages 4 and 5. I think that length is fine, and probably easier to cast than a shorter rod. Plus, now that they're older, they still haven't outgrown the rods.

George Forster
Fort Collins, CO

If cutting the blanks isn't a comfortable option, you may want to look at ice rod blanks. Those were the first rods I made for my kids three years ago. I used Netcraft IM6 graphite, 42 inches, .225 butt. I used the biggest size I could find, but they tend to go out of stock in the summer pretty frequently. Mudhole stocks something similer these days, I believe, as well. I love the way it looks, and it's stout enough to land the occasional bigger fish as well.

Other durable options, especially for kids...you may want to look at a short glass rod

The colors may have to come from thread or EVA choices instead of the blank.

-Scott

I have a 5'6" pink one on my rod dryer right now. My daughter will be 3 on Sat and it's her first rod. I elected not to cut it down because I want her to grow into it...and we have 6lb bass in the pond!

I do have to admit that I was not pleased with the pink color...it's more of a salmon. I'm not sure if the mix was off or what, but it's not like the picture in the catalog or online. The purple, however, is beautiful! I built two purple 7'ers for a local guy here and he LOVES them.

jeremy

This is a one I built on a 5'6" Mudhole blank for my son. Nice little blank.

[www.rodbuilding.org]

Mike

Cheng,
Actually, for this application, it is tough to beat going to Walleye World and picking up a 4 foot pink and a 4 foot purple rod for about $4 each.
Take care
Roger

FYI, I was at Jann's last Friday and there wer still a bunch of ice blanks in the bin in the corner. So they are probably still in stock if you went that route.

If you want something that will be stout enough they'll be able to use when they grow up, consider:

[rodbuilding.org]

My seven year old sports one and it works great. They're tough little boogers and 5'6" isn't a bad length for young kids. They don't come in pink or purple, though.

Jason Cosby
Cos Rods

Thanks all for the great responses and ideas. The mudhole blanks were the first ones to come to mind when he asked for a couple of rods
for his g-daughters...il give it some more thought...and cutting is no big deal - if I have to, I have to...

roger wilson Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Cheng,
> Actually, for this application, it is tough to
> beat going to Walleye World and picking up a 4
> foot pink and a 4 foot purple rod for about $4
> each.
> Take care
> Roger


Is there a website or some sort of contact for them? I can't seem to find anything on them. I see world walleye...but no walleye world...
Thanks again

I think Roger was referring to Wal-Mart :)...I could be wrong though.

Justin,
You have that right.
Yes, typically Wall Mart has childrens rods in various colors for under $5.
Even if you want to change it, it could be an inexpensive source for an ok childrens blank.

Roger

Here is a Barbie Pole for $13, that most little girls would love.
[www.walmart.com];

or a Dora pole for $11
[www.walmart.com];

A couple of years ago, I was going to the lake with my grand children and 1/2 way to the lake realized that I had left my life jackets behind. We stopped at the local WM store and picked up some Dora life jackets and towels.
They were totally happy with the purchase.

We did some fishing after we did some other water sports and the childrens 15 minutes of fishing with some of my poles were enough to catch a few pan fish and completly make them happy.

The thing with small children is that their attention span is short. They really don't care about what they use when they go fishing. All that they want is to be with someone that cares for them and is willing to spend a few minutes of thier time with them.
If they can happen to catch a fish or two in the 10 minutes to an hour that they are willing to spend. Fine.

The key thing with children is to open their eyes to new experiences, but don't force the experiences down their throats. If they want to fish for 10 minutes and then want to do something else - stop fishing and do something else. Otherwise, you will ruin the experience for the child and they will never ever want to fish again.

These are some of the reasons that I don't advocate spending a lot of time and money to make a simple little rod for small children. If they can get a small glass pole that will give them a few minutes of time at the lake - great.

Take care
Roger

P.S.
When the children got a few years older - I did build a nice set of pink ultra light 6and 5 1/2 foot rods for the girls.
I used a pair of Mudhole pink blanks built up with pac bay minima guides, nice cork grips and Aero Minima reel seats. Great rods on which they have caught lots of fish, since they are old enough to enjoy the rods and appreciate taking care of them.

I left one of the rods at 6 feet for the older child and cut the other one to 5'5". Both are great rods and have found a lot of enjoyment.

Take care
Roger

look to anglers workshop, they have "G-tips" which are front half of some fly rods. Bought a handfull for less than 20.00 and made some sweet 4.5' pan fish rods for my son. Great action and cheap for when he steps on it, cause it will happen at some point.

You may want to consider building the rods with underspin reels instead of the typical thumb-on-top kinda closed face reel. I've found that my nephews and nieces learn to cast these underspin reels much more easily than the thumb-on-top reels, they don't have the extra weight on top of the rod that they need to hold up, and once they get older you can simply swap out the underspin reel for a standard open faced spinning reel.