8 minute read
THE ULTIMATE SMALL STREAM ROD?
FROM CARBON FIBRE TO BAMBOO AND GLASS, ULTRALIGHTWEIGHT BLANKS TO THOSE WITH A LITTLE MORE HEFT, RODS DESIGNED FOR TRAVEL AND ONEPIECE RODS THAT ALWAYS STAY RIGGED, ED HERBST HAS SPENT YEARS WORKING ON THE IDEA OF THE ULTIMATE SMALL STREAM FLY ROD. IN A ONE-PIECE CTS GLASS ROD BUILT BY DEREK SMITH, HE MAY JUST HAVE HAD HIS EUREKA MOMENT.
The south-easterly wind was called the ‘Cape Doctor’ in colonial times because the residents in South Africa’s founding city believed that it swept away the ubiquitous refuse and the maladies associated with this malodorous situation.
Fly anglers find Cape Town’s summer gales far from benign, particularly when they blow downstream and, when I moved to the city and joined the Cape Piscatorial Society 40 years ago, I really struggled. In my beginner’s ignorance I assumed that line weight rather than line speed was the answer and I acquired a nine foot six weight carbon fibre Orvis rod. At the time I had started fishing with Tony Biggs, originator of that legendary dry fly, the RAB. Tony fished a six and a half foot, split cane Lee Wulff Midge made by Farlowes, who rated it a five weight. Tony underlined it with a four weight line to speed it up.
Ed Herbst tests out the CTS rod he had built for Western Cape small streams (left and centre) and rod-builder Derek Smith with the rod outside the Red Cross Children’s Hospital (right).
As it so happened, when we arrived at the stream on the first occasion that I used my new rod, there was brisk downstream breeze and I knew that I had called it right. I had brought a knife to a knife fight and Biggsy was going to struggle with his toothpick.
Big mistake. When we broke for a midday sandwich and coffee I admitted defeat and asked Tony if I could try his rod. I was astonished.
Short rods cast tight loops, the split cane rod loaded well under its own weight and Tony was better-equipped on the day. I was reminded of this occasion recently when I bought Yuki Bando’s book Mostly Bamboo – Eighteen Bamboo, Fiberglass and Graphite Fly Rod Makers in Japan (Flybito Press 2020).
One of his interviewees is Satoshi Maruyama – nickname So - who makes a radical carbon fibre rod called the Solid Octagon: ‘So believes most of the major rod makers have been too enthusiastic about making fly rods lighter for years. If you use a light fly rod, it is difficult to turn over a fly with a 12foot leader of 6X in a short distance. It is just because the rod does not have enough weight to bring the fly, tippet, and leader forward.’ My perception now is that the greater weight of a fiberglass rod would make it load more easily for shortrange casts than carbon fibre and that this, along with its lesser expense and acknowledged durability, explains the substantial growth in the number of rod makers who sell custom, light-line fly rods which are ideal for small streams. My previous collaboration with fellow Capetonian Stephen Boshoff – renowned for his superb centre axis split cane rods – in the search for the ultimate small stream fly rod is detailed in two articles. The first, ‘The One-off One Weight’ (2002) can be found in the Tackle folder on the website of the Cape Piscatorial Society and the second, in 2010, ‘The Search for the Ultimate Small Stream Fly Rod’ can be found on Tom Sutcliffe’s web site.
Derek Smith has been building fly rods since 1987 and I asked him to incorporate all our previous ideas, the ‘Palm Grip’ and Lefty Kreh’s idea of offsetting the guides towards the line hand in a three weight rod built on a CTS blank as a charity rod to be auctioned for the benefit of the Red Cross Children’s Hospital in Cape Town. To enhance performance and feel and lower weight, I specified a single piece blank for those who park their vehicles within walking distance of the streams they fish. The resulting rod surpassed my expectations when I cast it on the lawn of the retirement home where I live, justifying my belief that CTS is the world leader in fibreglass blank manufacture.
They will design and manufacture a blank to your specifications in a huge range of colours. Frontier Fly Fishing in Johannesburg has donated an iconic small stream reel, the Sage Click and a Sci-Anglers Mastery fly line to the project. So far, the fly fishing community has raised R575 000 for the hospital and the money raised by the winning bid on this rod, reel and line will help equip the newly-built emergency centre. To get photographs to illustrate this article, the editor fished it on a local trout stream.
He confirms my belief that Derek Smith’s execution of the brief’s design parameters, combined with the technological excellence of the CTS blank, has produced an affordable, rugged and attractive rod which will enhance the experience of those who love what Ernest Schweibert called ‘The Song of the Little Stream’.
Ed’s small stream glass rod, the Sage reel and Scientific Anglers fly line could be yours via silent auction. Simply email your bid to info@themissionflymag.com with your full name, telephone number and delivery address in case you turn out to be the lucky bidder. The winning bid will be announced at the end of March.
THE TAYLOR SWIFT TEST
The Mission editor Tudor Caradoc-Davies tests the rod on the Smalblaar river Beat 1.
When Ed told me about this one-piece CTS glass rod he had made by Derek Smith, it sounded like my kind of rod. On our skinny Cape streams down in the Western Cape of South Africa, I usually fish a 7’6” 4-weight Epic glass rod (coincidentally also built by Derek Smith) from The Swift Fly Fishing Company, another New Zealand rod brand. For these streams most people fish a 2 or 3-weight and I used to too until I won the Epic on auction and gave it a bash. For dry fly fishing (Cape Doctor or no Cape Doctor), it handles all conditions and kicks ass, plus even small fish put a satisfying bend in the rod while it can handle much bigger fish too. I call it my Taylor Swift outfit as it’s paired with a Taylor reel. I tested the CTS for Ed and absolutely loved the rod, but probably for slightly different reasons to the ones that motivated Ed’s decades-long quest. Here’s what I found:
IT’S NOT SUPER LIGHT
I get the appeal of light rods, but I’ve never really understood the obsession with rods so light they feel like little more than a piece of grass in hand. It always felt like it was one of those pointless arms races humans engage in, like that period in the early 90s when tiny phones were all the rage, or the ongoing fixation with uber-expensive watches that can handle being 300m underwater (when most people never dive deeper than the deep end of a swimming pool). This rod has a comforting weight to it that gave me confidence from the get-go.
IT CAN HANDLE THE DOCTOR
The day I tested this rod, the morning started off relatively still but by 11-12am the wind was gusting downstream and getting our dries down where wanted them to be became a lot harder. I adjusted my cast to make a faster, punchier forward cast and the CTS one-piece did the rest, laying down RABs and hoppers exactly where I wanted them in the bubble line.
IT’S A SHOCK-ABSORBER
I have a tendency, especially in the early season when I’m a little too eager and rusty, to strike too hard. On carbon fiber rods I’ve found that can result in small fish flying through the air or the 6x tippet breaking. Glass small stream rods like the CTS and Taylor Swift are forgiving, protect the tippet by acting as a shock absorber between the lightning fast strike of our small stream rainbows and the over-enthusiastic/clumsy movements of the angler.
IT’S TOUGH
Another reason I like glass rods, especially where the wading is challenging, is because they are incredibly hardy. Having had a few knee reconstructions over the years, I tend to wipe out a lot and as such Taylor Swift has come in for the kind of abuse the mere thought of which would have snapped a 000-weight carbon-fiber rod. The CTS is equally tough and will do duty for you for years to come.
IT’S PRACTICAL
Even though I live 45 minutes away from the streams, I love the idea of a one-piece, a rod designed so specifically for regular fishing on hyper-local waters that you need never break it down. When not fishing, hang it from the wall so that it speaks to you every day, asking you to take it out for another session.
