Creek Fly Rods

While on a nice little Rio one day, I was thinking about how incredibly good my 7' 3wt rod was working for me. And my thoughts wondered over to the question of how could a rod company make a new rod that would perform any better than this classic Winston I was casting. I mean the rod is amazing. After fishing for a while, I came to the conclusion that no company could make a new rod these days that I would prefer more than this old classic Winston. It's the quintessential creek rod.

On my regular rotation of fishing spots, there is a wide variety of stream conditions that favor a certain rod model over other rods. As a result, I have a core quiver of rods that go fishing depending on which stream I'm at for a given day:

• Winston Glass Retro 6'6" 3wt - this rod goes to the tightest creeks I fish, where there just isn't much room to cast a line...lots of bow and arrow shots, side casts, and roll casting are the prescription for the day. And, a blast when fighting a leetle feller at the end of the line.
• Winston WT 7' 2wt - this rod goes to those mountain creeks where I need a low speed cast to land my dry fly as softly as I can. I usually fish this rod with a WF3F fly line to easily load the rod for those slow, sticky casts. It also is chosen for the size of trout I'm fishing...in the 6 inch to 12 inch sizes. I'll fish it with a WF2F when I'm on a more open stream where casting upstream to little pockets of water is the object of the day. Maybe the best 2wt rod model ever made by Winston (or anyone for that matter).
• Winston WT 7' 3wt - a fabulous rod that can do everything I want on a small mountain stream. I fish this rod when there is room for casting to pockets of water holding 6 inch to 15 inch trout on average, with the possibility of an even larger trout. This rod is my all-round creek rod.
• Winston IM6 7'6" 3wt - this rod model has been considered for decades the 3wt standard for small stream fishing...it's simply awesome for casting dry flies on streams with 6 inch to 18 inch trout, particularly on those stream environments where there's room to cast a fly with distance.
• Winston TMF 8' 4wt - the rod I prefer for small to medium streams with lots of room to cast a line. This rod is perfect for those high altitude streams and lakes that hold good size trout. It's good for those light, breezy days as well because of the four weight line.

I usually pair a couple of the above rods to take with me on day trips to my trout streams. Which ones? Well, that depends on the streams I'm visiting that day. Of note, from time to time I publish a post called, Drawing to a Perfect Pair on the blog. You can go to Labels and click on Perfect Pair to see them.

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