Home Forums Fishing Flyfishing New Cabela's TQR rod comes through

Bought a 5 ft. 6 inch, #4 Cabela's TQR rod a few months ago.
I've got a spring fed stream that has, for about a 1/4 of a mile, some really nice Brook Trout in it. And NOBODY fishes it. It's about 1.5 miles inside a roadless area. If you haven't really looked, you'd think nothing was in it. So narrow, I can step across it almost any where.
Caught two Brookies last Wednesday. One 5 incher, and a "whopper" 9 inch fish. Managed to miss hooking about five others. Had one nine inch fish I spooked twice w/o a hookup. What a ball. Average casting distance runs about 15 feet. Took me almost 5 mins to land that very scrappy, fat little 9 incher. Thought he was going to break off under a few cut banks, and roots, etc.
We seem to have several places like this. They don't even show on the maps as a rule. Either above or below, usually below, a meadow system. As long as the stream flow is consistant each year, and they have some cover, they do well as a rule.
Here's another thing I've found. If the stream has Lathontan Cutthroat Trout, don't count on seeing almost all of what's in that stream. They seem to spend almost all of their time hiding in the dark spots. Being pretty dark themselves, they are very difficult to see. Walked one such stream last summer and saw maybe three very small fish in over two miles. But when they did their spawning run up to the lake above the stream, they were packed in that area. Odviously there all the time. Just missed them.
The really funny thing is that the lake fishing in this wilderness, the Desolation Wilderness here in Kalifornia, is often not much. Alot of lakes have very few fish, sometimes none. I know one lake that's often barren, but the spring fed streams both above and below it have fish.
I've done alot of fishing throughout my life. Probably more fishing than hunting or shooting. Now, I guess I'm sort of jaded. But this small stream, off the beaten path stuff has really got me hooked. Heck, half of the fun is finding these places. And the short fly rod is the thing to catch them. E

I bought the little TQR, 5 foot, 2 weight. The first 6 inch trout I hooked doubled 'er over. Talk about FUN. I don't think I've hooked an 8 incher yet. I'm looking forward to the half pounder (juvenile steelhead, 13 - 17 inches with a few up into the low 20s) run on the lower Rogue which should be starting any time now. I'll probably use my heavier rod most of the time but you KNOW I gotta try for a hookup on the light rig, too.

Tom

Hit another spot a few days after the above. Since all of the brookies in that stream looked pretty small, I ended up fishing a small lake.
Using the classic roll cast pickup, I was able to cast 30 plus feet w/o difficultly. When I tried a dry fly, I got reminded of the lession to keep the line tight. Once I did that, I got another 8-9 inch brookie. Man, what fun. There is something about having them hit the fly right on the surface. Even if I do miss the strikes most of the time as I did here.
Well, at least I got one. A very memorable ocassion.
Now, I'm breaking out the longer, #4 pack rod and going for the back country cutthroats. E

Which pack rod? Last spring I picked up the 7 piece ... 8 foot, 4 weight. Is that the one you got? I went back to look at lighter, shorter yet this year but it looks like they've discontinued the 7 piece and only offer a 6 piece?

I got about another week of chaos, then I should be able to go back fishin' again.

It's an 8.5 footer, #4 weight line. Cabela's calls it their Stowaway 6, probably because it is a six piece rod.
Found out a #4 floating line does not cast well into a stiff wind...... E

My 7 piece is called a "stowaway 7" so I think your logic is spot-on.

I'm learning the hard way about light lines and wind. 'til 2 years ago my only fly rod was a 9 footer for an 8 line but I ran a 9 on it. Old Fenwick HMG ... a hell of a rod. My folks gave it to me for 8th grade graduation. We won't talk about how long ago THAT was. With finesse all things were possible. I could throw a full line head on into a 30 mph wind or work #16 dry flies on 1 pound tippet.

That doesn't mean it's the best tool for all those jobs, just that I could get 'er done. Sort of the .338 of fly rods. "Use enough rod."

Tom

Great analogy Tom.

You think that's old, my first fly rod is, and I still have it, a 9 ft., 9 wt., Fenwick glass rod that predates the HMG rods.
Like you said, he!! of a rod. Been known to throw steelhead flys 130 ft. or so, even for me. E

I had a 4wt 5 pc. Stoaway that was a very good rod. I think it was 7 ft. Unfortunately, I closed the pickup tailgate on it and broke it.

I've got a 6wt and a 5wt Stowaway. I don't fish them much anymore, and especially with the 6wt, it's heavy and logy. But the 4wt was just right.

I think they were about $75 when I bought them.

Y' know, I keep thinking I need one more rod ...

I'm hopeless.