ACTION OF A PERFECT TROUT ROD 221 



suits the strength of each rod used by the fisherman should 

 alone be used. The influence of an over heavy line on a 

 delicately actioned rod is just as bad for the rod as is that 

 of a too light line on the pleasure of casting the fly. 



It must be remembered when choosing a line that the 

 lighter the tapered line the less strain on the rod, the less 

 disturbance to the water as the line falls and the greater 

 the ease of lifting the line lightly from the water. The 

 usefulness of a line has as a rule gone when the tapered 

 portion is worn out, and as it is the tapered portion which 

 invariably goes first, the belly, or thicker portion of the 

 line, which in other respects will be quite sound, may, if 

 too heavy, be useless for the delicate work on most of our 

 dry fly streams. 



TOURNAMENT RODS 



However interesting Fly and Bait Casting Tournaments 

 may be, it is very questionable whether they have really 

 tended to improve either the methods of fishing or the 

 construction of the fly rod. Only a few competitors enter 

 for these contests, and but little advance in the art of fly 

 casting has, so far as I know, been evolved as a result of these 

 tournaments. For a maker to claim that his fly rods must 

 be the best weapons to fish with, because one carefully 

 selected rod, out of several thousands which he builds, has 

 in the hands of the most experienced fly thrower he can get 

 to use it, projected a fly, or thrown a bait, etc., a few inches 

 or a few feet further than another of his own rods, or the 

 rods of other makers, is as absurd as it would be for the 

 man who makes the longest cast of a fly, etc., to claim on 

 this account any superiority in his methods of fishing over 

 other men. 



While tournaments may be used as a convenient means 

 of advertising rods and rod sellers, such distinction has 



