Category Archives: product

Inflation fighting award to follow

wildcreek A split bamboo rod for less than the cost of a graphite?

One of those odd finds that you stumble on quite by accident, a handsome looking rod featured in an photo, and curiosity leads you to look up the maker.

Wild Creek Rods, of Australian origin and a small entrepreneur, but the rods are handsome and the costs are very reasonable. Only four models are available, but it’s still a neat find.

$489 US for any of the rods featured ($525AU), plus postage. Seven models of graphite are also available, for about $237 US.

Couch Potato float tube

Couch Float tube, that's living I’ve been struggling with the need to update my aging float tube, now I’m glad I waited.

The eighties version surrounded the angler in a donut of inflation – with little fear of slipping out of the beast accidentally. The latest tubes offer the open front – which aids an awkward entrance and exit ritual, but takes a little getting used to for us water averse types.

Leave it to Coleman to come up with what’s really needed, complete with “integrated cup holder”, it has all the safety features necessary to make me feel … drowsy…

All that’s needed is an inflatable remote and we can forget about that lawn entirely.

Ordering a Pizza might be a better way to get fed

Fishing with a cell phoneSkipping the fishing to go straight to the catching part sounds potentially cheaper, but the virtual odds sound much too realistic to be a cost savings.

I don’t think you’ll want to leave your cell phone lying around; $10 for three casts approximates the cost of fly fishing, but the idea that your kid could pizzle away your entire paycheck, worse yet, could win two or three hundred pounds of fish should cause you to blanch.

The game — called “Ippon Zuri” (which means “pole-and-line fishing”) — was created by FIT, a Fukuoka-based system development company who teamed up with a local seafood wholesaler. Game play is simple: players use the phone keys to cast bait to promising-looking fish in the game’s virtual waters, which include sea bream, crab, and other seasonal fish. When a fish takes the bait, the player is sent to a slot machine screen where, if luck prevails and 3 numbers line up appropriately, the virtual fish is hooked and reeled in. A message is then relayed to the wholesaler, who picks up the real-world equivalent from the local seafood market and delivers it, whole and raw, to the player’s doorstep.

Hardened anglers will balk at the slot machine segment, decrying that fishing could ever compare with any game of chance. I’m not so sure that fading light and tiny naturals isn’t exactly that – chancy at best to pick the correct fly and even less of seeing it to set the hook.

They tried the live action version on those Internet deer hunting sites, I’m guessing the webcam flavor can’t be far behind.

Coiled Stren Indicators

Boiled and Frozen Stren strike indicator Fish and Fly has posted the recipe for the “coiled strike indicator” in their follow-on to “Fishing the Frontier.” Singlebarbed reader, “Z Fisher” was correct in his description of the process; boiled Stren, wrapped around a Cutip, then frozen to make the coils permanent.

Anything that requires fiddling with cooking pots and slopping things onto the kitchen floor has to work in our book – that way the resulting bruises are worth it.

The big sweaty guy that used it last is our only hope

Needs a wading staff attachment I’m guessing this is proof positive that only the fishing part is bad for you; the financial drain, societal shunning, and the debris field of destroyed relationships aren’t cited – so only fishing causes those..

We’ve always known wading is a punishing exercise, now everyone will be stomping life out of invertebrates to “feel the burn.”

The design combines the unique benefits of exercising in water with a stylish treadmill. This results in exceptional levels of health, fitness and wellbeing.

What’s lost on the designers is the adrenalin surge of sliding towards deep water complements of worn felt or missing cleats, or the aerobic upper body workout as your grip on that tree limb falters, and Class 3 white water beckons.

That’s not “wellbeing” but any brush with Death certainly makes the living sweeter.

Finally, the cane rod we all can afford

Dust off your ascot and meerschaum, admittance to the “cane fraternity” is only pennies away. Then again, it may take a few decades for you to really appreciate the simplicity and elegance, giving you time to gather the appropriate accoutrements.

Don't laugh to hard

At $39.95 for the base model, comes with #8 line and appears to have as much tip flex as an axe handle. A little on the drab side, but the addition of a large arbor reel stuffed with day-glo backing should add measurably to the appeal.

Modern Flies of Italy

Trout don't like this stuff With nearly 800 lightning fires popping in California this week, I didn’t have time to do anything other than answer the pager, hoping vainly that I would be able to sleep at some point.

Sleep wasn’t in the cards, but in between tasks I was able to track down the source of the European competition rods mentioned in the Fish and Fly article of last week.

Modern Flies of Italy appears to be one of the vendors. The “Lamina” referenced in the articles only turned up reels from the BFR (British Fly Reel) company, additional sleuthing yielded the above vendor.

I always check the fly section just to see what’s in vogue on other continents, but the rods looked most worthy.

Current exchange rate is 1.56 dollars per Euro, in case you’re interested.

Bear with me, more lightning is due Wednesday so I’ll be less able to post. Those contemplating a weekend trip to the mountains should consult both fire maps and road closures, as much of Northern California is under some sort of restriction.

Current fire maps are available at the USGS fire planning tool. You may want to check the boundaries to see what’s burned over, or about to..

Them “blueliners” over at the Trout Underground have chosen to flee the state, leaving us pedestrian Brownliner’s to defend life and property.

Cell Phone Priest

Just smack 'em with it It’s guaranteed to take the fishing world by storm, a multipurpose gadget we’ll all find indispensable, combining the services of a “priest”, an agreed upon measuring standard, and a digital forum allowing you to torment the fellows back at the office.

…the Singlebarbed “Catch and Release” version substitutes a landing net for the weighted blunt end – not out of any sense of Purism, rather we catch so damn few fish we don’t need it.

Billed as the “longest cell phone in the world” – and just the kind of accouterment to redefine your angling experience. If the testosterone doesn’t flow ample enough simply just tuck it into your wader leg and vie for Alpha Male in the parking lot.

The handy digital display will verify fish length in centimeters, millimeters, or yards, and can snap that hero pose with the built in 7 mega-pixel camera.

Pollute your coworker’s email with a press of a button, but if you called in sick, remember to omit the boss’s address, else you’ve got some ‘splaining to do…

Jonah meets the Whale

The old “big fly, big fish” adage has been part and parcel of fly fishing lore for eons, now the same can be practiced with lure and plug fishermen.

For those rare opportunities when a foot long slab of broom handle festooned with yards of treble hooks just doesn’t cut it – GreatBigStuff.com has a partial solution…

Now even the whales aren't safe

Partial as I’m not quite sure what can throw it effectively, but 5 feet of wiggling fish death is likely to bring an appreciative whistle when you roar up to dockside.

I’d hang it off the arse-end of a boat tethered with water-ski hawser, at $447 each – pray you don’t snag it on a tree trunk.

The 20-inch spoon is no slouch, offering the angler a lethal change-up – or a spare anchor, depending on your mood..

To be on the careful side I’d toss in a couple extra jerry-cans of fuel – that’s a lot of drag to overcome.

Just pack it full of Hare’s Ears, Let Greed sort ’em out

Bait bomb schematic We clapped and cheered during Desert Storm, watching the “business end” of multi-million dollar weaponry aimed at some Iraqi latrine, who or what was inside was secondary to the sudden burst of static that signified mission successful…

Using the latest 3D CAD technology, Ferris-Tech has developed the worlds first time-release active bait delivery system to eject the bait in a sudden but calculated ‘bomb burst’.

All that’s really needed is some nose mounted camera where we can see the shocked expression and lips form the “Oh Sh..”

Hell, I’d give up fly fishing entirely if I could take turns painting trout with a laser – who couldn’t resist a little payback? We could toss all those silly wide arbor gimcracks in favor of face paint and SEAL satellite phones:

“Roger, Cahill-Six, the target is Invasive Species and  illuminated, recommend Bait Bomb set for wide dispersal, Over.”

Now who’s clamoring for Poppa to take him fishing? Every parent will exult as Junior leaps off the couch to give Mr Carp a black eye. Poppa regains hero status lost to video games, and the balance of Nature restored… well, kinda.