Double-hauling a size 18 Parachute Adams out into the middle of a pond on a windy day is not my normal fly fishing. But some days that is where the fish are, and that is what they’re biting. It was what was in front of me and I had to figure out a way to make it happen.
Which, of course, is what a lot of fly fishing comes down to.
Having a fly rod that can be versatile is helpful. It’s efficient and effective to be able to do most of your trout fishing with one tool. The more and more you fish, you figure out what your regular angling scenarios look like. You find your normal. You get what you need to hit that target and a little bit on either side.
So what if your target is high country lakes filled with finicky surface feeders? What if you need to throw a small flies, but you have to contend with windy conditions? What if you have to make delicate presentations far across the river? That kind of target can’t be hit by just any fly rod.
Recently I’ve been fishing the Douglas SKY 3-weight. It’s a 9′ rod with a moderate fast action. It’s their flagship rod, and it looks and feels the part.
The SKY 3-weight is the kind of rod you want for mountain lakes, spring creeks in wide valleys, or really dialing in precise presentations with smaller dry flies. This all comes from a rod that is built with the right stiffness through the blank balanced with a delicate tip section. Light tippets can both unroll on longer casts and be protected when setting the hook or fighting bigger trout.
It is qualities like these that separate great rods from good rods. On a lighter weight rod, it is key to have a taper that was designed with enough power to translate long casting strokes into sometimes necessary distance presentations. This is coupled with sufficient backbone for times when you might need to rotate in flies with a little weight or wind resistance; such as small streamers or nymphs under an indicator.
Here’s something else of note: I can say all of this about the SKY 3-weight, even though, for a time, I wasn’t truly fishing it properly. Why? The first time I took the rod out, I was actually casting with a line designed for small streams. The head on the line was very compact – designed for shorter casts. It wasn’t something that I thought of until after I was breaking down the rod at the end of the day. It was a small mistake, but the rod was able to compensate for that mistake. With a traditionally tapered line, the rod really shines.
I fish enough “big” mountain streams and trout ponds where a rod like the SKY makes sense. A shorter, softer 3-weight isn’t going to give me the casting power I’ll often need. A 5-weight isn’t going to have the gentle touch that’s often required. Versatility is good, but you want that versatility to revolve around the target of your normal fishing. It’s good that there are fly rods built for these unique, but very normal fly fishing situations.
Head over to the Douglas Outdoors website for more information on the SKY, and to see the complete lineup.
For an article focusing on the benefits of a long, lightweight rod check out this post.
If you want something with a little more finesse, I can’t recommend the Upstream from Douglas enough.