Off The Water
I still remember when fishing was fun. Pretty much every day in fact! I started out as a bit of a cross between a Tenkara and Czech Nymphing fisher, except with worms rather than a fly. We even hand crafted our own rods using a piece of long cane cut from the river bank, hung in a tree with a small weight tied to the tip to keep it straight while it dried.
Rigging was pretty simple, no reel, just a long piece of nylon cord (full sink) tied to the rod in three places. The first about three foot from the tip. A second halfway between the first and the tip. The last connection at the tip. This setup keeps you from losing a big fish in the event the tip breaks off. You still have two more connection points to back you up. From the end of the cord you tied in your mono line, what I now know to call leader but at the time it was just a piece of mono line. That end was usually tied to a brass swivel, to which a snelled hook rig (tippet) was attached. A bobber (strike indicator) was clipped onto the mono line at some point to set a depth. We’d cast the whole thing Switch Rod style, which at the time we called, “flinging it”.
My first fly box (worm can really) was a half-pound coffee can. It was way ahead of it’s time as it incorporated a water tight plastic lid. A fly box feature only relatively recently offered in fly box design. We upgrade to a much more portable version by tying some of that same full sink nylon cord to the can in a loop large enough to go over our head and shoulder. The portability of this new system allowed us to keep our baits readily available while wading. This opened up a completely new world for us and made my mom much happier about not finding worms in our shirt pockets anymore. Well, not as often anyway.
It's Still Just Fishing!