What was your first bamboo rod?

Discuss various makers rods here, i.e. if the maker is not listed under its own forum please feel free to discuss them here vintage or current. I would like to keep the makers listed by an individual read-only forum so it will be easier for those interested in those makers to find specific information about the rods and the makers. If anyone has any original catalogs they could scan and pass along to me I would be pleased to use them to give a history of the maker and their models in a forum, thanks.

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snorider
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#41

Post by snorider »

My first bamboo rod came to me in a strange way... I was helping a friend clean out a basement for his dad. The apartment above had been occupied by Al for over 50 years and when my friends father bought the house he was allowed to stay with no change in rent. This old fellow was a kind and gentle bachelor and had passed away recently with no known relatives to take care of his meager estate. My friend Jeff and I were hauling a lifetimes accumulation of books, magazines, worn out appliances and papers up from probably the spookiest basement in Bozeman. The house was built in 1890 and had, over the years, been a mansion, brothel, mortuary and tenement. The old back stair of the house had been closed off in several places to make three apartments and the lower end of the stairs led from Al's apartment to the basement. I am not a very superstitious person but the stories associated with those apartments still makes my skin crawl. Another friend rented one of the rooms in the 1990's and after running into the street screaming in her undies she called a catholic priest over to perform an exorcism. She had used several srews to keep a cabinet shut cause it kept opening during the night, after she shut off the lights the door flew across the room and left a dent in the far wall!!! YIKES.... any how this basement was SPOOKY to say the least and we were hurrying to finish the job. Just as we were finishing up the door to the upstairs shut itself, causing my hair to stand up even further and there behind the door was Al's bamboo fly rod in an aluminum tube. Jeff gave it to for the help and we got the heck out of there. Anyway it is a South Bend 5256 9' 6wt and I still use it on occasion. I will never sell it too many memories, and perhaps a spirit attached....
Leave it as it is. The ages have been at work on it and man can only mar it. T.R.

Angle
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#42

Post by Angle »

I wish I knew.......
Went to work on my brother-in-law's farm during the summer of my 13th year and with my first weekly pay asked him to take me to town. He says "what for?" I says for a fishing pole. So off we go and into the local hardware store I found a barrel of fishing poles. While looking them over the sales guy says "what'll it be, lad?" Says I "A fishing pole". He says "Here's one and here is a reel to go with it".
Fished the local river (upstate NY area) just about every night that summer.
Years pass, as they always do. Finished high school. Joined the service. Traveled around this great country of ours. Still had my fishing pole and reel.
In southern MS, building a Navy Submarine. Heading to a ship's party/outing. Packing up the car to head home, set the fishing pole and reel next to a tree, so I would not damage it, and drove home. Got home, unloaded, jumped right back into the car and drove back. Of course...it was gone.
As I recall, it was a bamboo rod with a bait casting reel....

Sure wish I still had my first fishing pole and reel.

Angle

DUCKMANNM
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#43

Post by DUCKMANNM »

I started out with a Hardy Palakona 6'6" 5 wt. I let a friend talk me into selling it to him. Then the jerk turned around and sold it to someone else for $75.00 more. Hey, what are friends for?




I yearn for an America where a chicken does not have to justify it's thoughts!

DUCKMANNM
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Location: Albuquerque, New Mexico USA

Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#44

Post by DUCKMANNM »

My first bamboo rod was an Orvis 7/3 7 Foot 3 Weight 2/1. Broke it in on Hot Creek near Mammoth Lakes. Got my first Orvis Pin with a 15" rainbow caught on a #20 dry wooly worm! Like a fool, I let a friend talk me into selling it to him!

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pgwulf
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#45

Post by pgwulf »

My first bamboo rod was an Orvis Superfine, 7' 2/2, 6 wt that I purchased in 1973 from the Orvis catalog for $167.50...with my name written on it. I still have that rod & still fish it with a Hardy Featherweight reel.
"Outside a dog, a book is man's best friend...inside a dog, it's too dark to read!" Groucho Marx

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SpringCreek
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#46

Post by SpringCreek »

My first bamboo rod was one I made myself. I had built a couple of graphite rods from blanks and enjoyed it, but thought it wasn't challenging enough. About that time I ran across some information bamboo and the rest is history. I still have my first rod, a Dickerson 8013, and fish it to this day. For doing it on my own without anyone to guide me, I think it turned out quite well.

Jim
Then as it was, then again it will be. Though the course may change sometimes, rivers always reach the sea. - Led Zeppelin, 10 Years Gone

http://www.splittingcane.com

windy
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#47

Post by windy »

Back in the 50's, an old feller spotted me walkin' along the crick with my telescoping steel pole in one hand and a forked stick fulla trout in the other, and took me to his tackle shed, where he had half-a-century's worth of gear. I left there with a 9' 3-piece Monkey Wards rod and a bunch of leader stuff (Racine-Tortue, I think it said on the spool) and a book of flies on short, stiff snells. Before I finally busted that rod, I had rubber-taped a borrowed Mitchell 300 to it and landed an 8-pound carp and a small sturgeon I dredged up offa the Snake River banks (with worms) and fished it on several cricks on the St. Joe River drainage in Northern Idaho using live grasshoppers when the flies got lost in the bushes. One tough Monkey Wards rod, I can tell you. Fished fiberglass for a few years, then bought a 9-1/2' Leonard 8-wt that got me re-addicted. Ain't been able to shake it fer the forty years since. Had some good Heddons, several more Leonards, some Grangers and some sweet South Bends, pieced a few together from a large collection of blanks, restored and gave away a rod with each of my daughters and made sure my Mom and Pop and brother and sister each had one and then sold off most of a hundred spools of Belding Corticelli silk I had collected, my culms and reel seats and my Pratt & Lambert varnish to guys that wanted to keep up the tradition. Still got rods I ain't fished yet.
windy

sonny, whar i growed up, "magnum" wuz another word fer "lousy hunter"

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wineslob
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#48

Post by wineslob »

Late to the show but I honestly don't know. I picked up the rod at a flea market probably in the mid 80's for 25 bucks. I never fished it, and the only thing I can remember about it was an oval label on it that said "On the circle, Palo Alto Ca.".

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ibookje
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#49

Post by ibookje »

A Tom Moran 7ft #4 I bought from a friend who had two.

samsonboi
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#50

Post by samsonboi »

A beautiful L.W. Samson that I broke a couple years ago. My worst break ever.
"Car ce n'est pas assez d'avoir l'esprit bon, mais le principal est de l'appliquer bien.”- Descartes

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Brian K. Shaffer
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#51

Post by Brian K. Shaffer »

What a post to reflect on.
______________________

My first was a refinished 8 1/2 foot Wright McGill Victory that I sill have and fish.
The unoriginal brass pipe rod tube was 1/2 the reason for the purchase.
The Anglers Co. logo affixed to tube cap top, dated the tube to the early 1900's.
" There's no such thing as a fly fisherman wholly satisfied with his casting performance. " ~ Jim Green (1971)
" Just once I wish a trout would wink at me. " ~ Brian Shaffer

Use the SEARCH for justification and reasoning.

PYochim
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#52

Post by PYochim »

A 7’9” Eden Cane in a 3 weight. Beautifully made rod but I couldn’t land a decent sized fish on it. 10 inches felt like trophies. That was my first and last encounter with these cute little 3 weights. I sold it for more than I paid for it.

Addelliot
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#53

Post by Addelliot »

An 8' 3 pc EW Edwards Mt. Carmel 70D. Was built by EW for my Grandfather back in the late 20's, and passed down to me in the late 60's. It has been refinished once, and has had a couple of tip ferrule repairs over the past few years by Wm (Streamer) Abrams. It is still my favorite fly rod for more than sentimental reasons. It is the easiest casting rod I have ever fished. As long as I'm fishing it correctly, it almost disappears in my hands. My living reminder of the Great Man whose name I bear.

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BSAGuy
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Re: What was your first bamboo rod?

#54

Post by BSAGuy »

I am new to this game (first trip was Sept., 2023), but I recently bought a Folsom 1515 (Heddon #14) 9', 3/2, 2F. Haven't had it out on the water yet, but itching to try it with the Peach 444 WF6F that I bought from a classified here.
Be Prepared

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