CHAPTER II 

 THE FLY ROD 



IT would seem that the tentative dry fly cas- 

 ter cannot too carefully consider the details 

 of the rod which he will use in the pursuit 

 of the sport. The majority of anglers cannot 

 well afford a battery of fly-rods; moreover, there 

 is no market for used fishing rods, as in the case 

 of firearms, so that if the rod proves unsatis- 

 factory it cannot be got rid of unless one prac- 

 tically gives it away. It is claimed that, in time, 

 an angler will " grow to " any sort of rod, re- 

 gardless of its unfitness to him personally or of 

 inherent faultiness in some respect; possibly this 

 is true. Patience is, indeed, a virtue possessed 

 by many good fishermen, but, in this instance, 

 it is safe to say that not one fly-caster in twenty 

 can bring himself to the continued use of a rod 

 from which he derives no pleasure and which 

 actually handicaps him on the stream. 



The demands of dry fly casting on the rod 

 are exacting in the extreme. On a river where 

 there is much dry fly water probably the rod 

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