Monday, April 25, 2016

A little fishing and some customer support comments

I got out on Saturday evening on the Main Branch of the White River.  Despite the wind, I stupidly took my three weight with me, hoping to do some tight-line nymphing.  The water flows on the White were at 1150 cfs - well within my parameters for safe wading.  The water temperature was in the mid-40's.

To combat the wind and get my flies deep enough, I ended up with a bizarre rig.  My 3 weight is a 10 foot rod - my primary nymphing set-up.  I had a Rio Euro Nymph leader as my starting point.  But, knowing that woolly buggers have been producing fish for some locals, I put on a weighted olive woolly bugger and a bead head Prince Nymph.  I felt like I wasn't getting deep enough in the main hole I was fishing, so I added a split shot above the tippet ring.  And then, to get a cleaner dead drift, I added a foam strike indicator.  I'm sure this is not how most people fish a nymphing rod with a nymphing leader.  Oh well.

The wind made casting challenging, but the split shot helped.  I started at the bottom of a pool that I really like, and slowly made my way upstream.  My shadow was downstream of me, so I worked slowly to the better water at the top of the pool, trying to keep my shadow off the fishy water for as long as possible.  At the top of the pool, you can wade out a bit more and it becomes easier to get a nice dead drift.  And suddenly, I started to get strikes, at the end of the drift, as the flies were moving up in the water column.  In 15 minutes, I had 6 solid strikes, yet I never managed to hook a fish, even for a moment.  I was guessing that the fish were short-striking the bugger.  I thought about cutting off the tail of the bugger to eliminate the possibility of a short strike, but by the time I was ready to try it, the strikes had ceased.  I fished another hour until sunset with no more strikes.  With warm weather forecast for next weekend, I'm hoping I finally catch a fish.  It seems that last season was one of my poorest seasons ever in VT (being sick for a lot of the season didn't help), and I'm off to a slow start again this year.

I know I'll do well with fish when I go to CA and fish with a guide in June, but I'd like to be catching some fish on my own as well.  I am also trying to schedule a day with a local guide to fish for Pike on Otter Creek next month.  It would just be a half day, to see if I enjoy it, to learn a bit about fishing for pike on the fly, and to decide if I want to start tying the big pike flies I would need.  Luckily, the 8 weight rod I used for salmon when I lived in Alaska is perfect for pike fishing.

On another subject, I've had a few equipment issues recently, and thought I'd add some comments about customer support from 3 major players in the fly fishing industry - Patagonia, Simms and Sage.

Let's start with Patagonia.  I use their Foot Tractor wading boot and I like it a lot.  But, it was time to replace the aluminum bars and I ordered the kit to do that.  Regretfully, the bars couldn't be removed.  There was too much rust on the old bolts, the allen head wrench that came with the replacement kit stripped easily, and it also stripped some of the bolts.  I sent the entire thing back to Patagonia.  They charged me $5.00 for shipping.  I just got notification that I have a package arriving on Wednesday from them.   I don't know yet if they were able to install the new bars or if they sent me new boots.  But, the price was great and the service was fast.

Because the Patagonia boots were out of service, I purchased some Simms G3 Guide boots for the first few weeks of the season.  I also bought a set of aluminum studs to bolt to the bottom of the boots.  Regretfully, in just 2 days of fishing, 9 of the 10 studs were gone.  I contacted Simms technical support.  They told me I should have used Aquaseal on the screws when I installed the boots.  I went back and looked the documentation I had.  The only comment I could find about the studs was that the boot midsole is made from a special material that helps to retain the screwed-in studs.  I went back to Simms and suggested that they should improve their documentation, and also consider adding a tube of Aquaseal to the kit for the studs.  They agreed that the documentation needs work, and offered to send me some Aquaseal and a new set of studs for free.  The shipment arrived in 2 days.  My biggest dilemma now is having 2 pairs of boots I like a lot.  My wife has suggested that I try to sell one of them.  But, to be honest, I like them both, and I'm hesitant to get rid of either, despite knowing that I will never need both of them at once.  Simms did a great job supporting their product and it's a great boot.

Lastly, I broke the tip on an older Sage rod last fall - an RPL+ that I purchased around 1995 or so.  The rod has a lifetime warranty.  Regretfully, that warranty isn't cheap at all to use.  I had to spend $10 for a mailing label to return the rod to Sage and then another $60 for the repair and return postage.  So, a lifetime warranty comes with a pretty hefty fee, in my opinion.  Paying $70 to fix a $500 product isn't exactly what I feel like I was promised when I bought the rod.  Yes, it's not a new rod, and I've gotten a lot of use out of it.  But, the lifetime warranty was part of what I purchased and paid for when I got the rod.  I find their price to be a bit excessive, to be honest.  They claim the $60 covers processing, insurance and return postage.  The rod is due to arrive on Wednesday, and I'm curious if they replaced the tip or repaired it.  Either is fine with me, but their pricing for a lifetime warranty seems excessive.

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