TheOkieAngler.com

I have to start out by saying I’m the kind of guy that gets attached to a fly rod. I fished the same (warrantyless) rod, day in – day out, for nearly 10 yrs. Unless I was mixing it up in the salt, you could bet the house on it… I was heading out with the Cortland in hand.

I received a gift last Christmas, however, that pretty much resulted in the retirement the ol’ Cortland… my first Sage rod. Between limited finances and some sort of anti-elitist urge to avoid the big name brands, I had never even casted one until I opened it from under the tree. After switching over a reel and making a few casts in the front yard, I knew the poor Cortland had probably seen its last days on the water.

Fast forward from Christmas to early May: winter is finally over and the Oklahoma Spring rains are making the fish go pretty much crazy. I’m out at a pond chasing after carp and throwing at mud plumes. After a nice cast to some nervous looking water I feel a little bump. A solid hookset results in some resistance… but no fight. I figure I must be dragging in some trash, but of course not. This guy surfaces:

Hardly even hooked... sheesh

I was running low on stock of the “hot” fly of the day and didn’t want to give it up without at least trying to get it back! So I did what any person in my situation would do (at least I keep telling myself that); I ran the rod tip down the leader to quickly jam the hook off of the turtle’s neck. Big, big mistake. A quick CHOMP later, and I’m tipless.

I was angry at myself for being an idiot and losing the tip of my new “baby” over a stupid fly, but hey, at least I had a warranty to fall back on. I took it back to the shop where it was purchased and was able to send it back to Sage with no problems. I’m not sure Tom at Backwoods believed me that the turtle was to blame, but off it went to get fixed.

A few weeks and $50 later, she was back and in pristine condition. A warranty success story, right? I thought so, and probably still think so… but I ran across this article by Zach Matthews on midcurrent.com that’s making me reevaluate my warranty position. Having loss protection from a private insurer sure sounds nice, especially for those times you (we) forget a rod on top of the car…

After spending quite a bit of time on the water the past couple weeks, I figured I needed to tone things down a touch and spend a little more quality time with Reese. I managed to get a guilt free fishin’ pass on Thursday though… an opportunity that DEMANDS to be taken advantage of!

I’ve been wanting to scout out a few new areas I’ve been hearing about (stay tuned!), but I decided to stop off at my favorite local golf course pond to get in a big fish fix. It had been over a week since I had seen the backing on my reel; obviously chasing down some big carp and/or catfish was in order. The LMFR wild rainbows were a treat, don’t get me wrong… but there’s something addictive about hearing your reel scream and finding bruises on your stomach from fighting fish.

The water was a couple feet lower than the last time I had seen the pond and the fish weren’t feeding in any of the areas where I had seen them before. I only had a couple of hours to fish and was worried I was going to strike out. I kept walking along the bank and found some promising activity in the form of a tail flicking around above the surface. I figured it was a carp, but upon closer inspection it turned out to be one of these:

Cat tailing along the bank

He had his head buried under the edge of the bank most of the time, giving me a great chance to get above him and highstick/dap a crawfish imitation (headstand) right next to his face. He didn’t look twice, grabbed it almost immediately and was off to the races.  He wasn’t a monster but still managed to put a solid bend in the rod.

Meow

I didn’t have too much success following the catfish so I took off to a different area of the pond… Spotted a shadow moving around a few feet off the bank. I tossed one about a foot in front of his nose and hoped it was a big carp. Gave it a few strips and saw the shadow turn… set the hook and the water exploded. He went on a decent initial run, but began running 30-40ft back and forth along the bank with an occasional run into deeper water. I wasn’t sure what I was hooked into until I was able to finally drag him in close.

Throwing off a nice vortex... headed on another run

He wasn’t a monster, but the fight lasted long enough to put a few bruises on my stomach and for a few different groups of golfers to finish the hole I was fishing near. I don’t know that I’ll ever get tired of catching these fish.

Sayin' hi