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Any other details? Gordon's sessions are $120 per person with a single instructor and class size of 5. For $150 per person and two instructors how many students and how many hours?

I'm already signed up for Gordon's clinic in April. If it was a bit later than May I'd be up for it. That way it would give me enough time to put into practice what he taught me and be ready for some more advanced stuff or casting corrections. Francois is quite good. I told him about a casting problem I was having so he grabbed a single-handed rod and took me to the casting pool. He had it diagnosed and fixed within 10 minutes.

I thought you said it was the flavour of the month last Saturday

Never met him myself. A lot of the points he makes about DH rods being useful on the Bow mirror the ones Toolman and others here have made. With any luck it might encourage more of the shops in town to increase their selection of Spey gear and learn about it themselves. I don't have any problem ordering stuff from Courtney, but if you just need a polyleader for the next day's fishing it can be a pain....

The last gathering we had helped me out a lot. Not just casting techniques but also info about things like polyleaders and so on. Look into the Rio Modern Spey Casting DVD and Simon Gawesworth's Spey Casting book. Both great resources for learning casting and correcting faults.

Anyone else take a look at the Alberta Spey article in the latest issue of Canadian Fly Fisher? The cover story no less...

Sounds like we'll soon have enough in Calgary to do a clave. Maybe the next nice Saturday we should do another big stick gathering like we had a few weeks ago...

Yeah, with the Elixir lines if you think the reel has just enough capacity, get a bigger one. I thought an Elixir 5/6 for my switch rod would fit on a Danielsson 6nine no problem. Chopped 20' of running line and only managed to get 75 yds of 20# on it. Even then the line rubbed the frame when it was reeled in all the way. Wasn't willing to wreck the line, chop more running line, or reduce the backing so I ended up getting a bigger capacity reel for it.

I can tell you from personal experience that the Elixir lines don't match anywhere close to a WF line for capacity. My Nautilus 10 lists 250 yds of 30# dacron for a WF10 line. The Elixir 6/7 (380 gr.) went on that reel with 200 yds of 20# and it was a perfect fit with 20' of running line chopped off. The Elixirs are more like Skagit lines as they have fairly thick shooting heads. If you don't want to mess around with trial and error, you could try emailing Islander or Beulah to see if they have any experience with your line/reel combination. When I emailed Beulah, Bruce Berry got back to me within 24 hours (though he didn't have any experience with Elixirs on a Nautilus). EDIT: You could also try seeing if anyone at Speypages has put that line on a reel with similar capacity to your Islander. At the very least that would give you a rough starting point for the backing.

Snowbee XD line? I can't find it on their website. I take it that it's a single-hand line and not a spey?

Heh, I did. Snowbee 13' 8/9 with a Snowbee XS Scandinavian floating line. Even got down to the river for an hour or so yesterday to test it out. Also got a few casting pointers from Francois from Whistler Fly Fishing.

Picked up intermediate and fast sink Snowbee braided leaders from Courtney yesterday. The first noticeable thing about them is that there is almost no memory to them and a little stretch. They're only 5' long and taking one end in each hand and giving a light pull straightens them right out. Looking forward to trying them out on the water, but looking out the window and at the forecast I don't think I'll have a chance to for a little while...

I bought some for my 5 wt rod but haven't had a chance to cast it yet. All it comes down to is if you're happy with what you're currently using and don't think a different line will change anything for you, then stick with it. If you like to experiment with different setups, give it a try. I doubt it would be the first time someone blew $100 on some fly fishing gear on the off chance it might improve their ability to catch fish.

Call ahead if it isn't a short trip to West Winds for you. I seem to remember that it was before Christmas that I saw it there.

I think I recall seeing copies of it at West Winds. You could always buy one there and take it to the show for Jim to sign

He had copies of Blue Ribbon Bow for sale at Troutfitters on Saturday when he did the signing for the new book. Maybe Troutfitters still has some left otherwise with any luck he might have copies at the show this weekend.

Probably worth bringing a few bottles of it out. I'm sure most of the guys reading this thread would want to pick some up, myself included.

Great idea TM. One of the things I've noticed is that there are plenty of books and dvds on spey casting but they barely touch on rigging beyond rod, reel, and line. Ok, so Beulah recommends using a leader 1.5 times the length of the rod - 10' poly for switch and 14' for spey. Is this a Beulah thing or is it a general rule of thumb? Also, are there situations where you would want to use longer/shorter polyleaders like with heavier or lighter flies?

Hi Rob, I have a Beulah 5/6 switch and it's a nice rod. I found it very easy to use for spey casts on my first outing, but haven't really tried overhead casting with it. I had initially considered the 4/5 as well, but Beulah doesn't make a matching Elixir line for that rod. I'm not sure how well the 4/5 would work overlined with the 5/6 Elixir but IslandGuy would probably have a good idea. The reason I wanted the matching Elixir line was that the line is designed to be used for both spey and overhead casts and it's matched specifically to that rod. I've heard lots of good things about the z-axis spey and switch rods as well as the Gary Anderson rods but have no experience with either one. I think you're choosing between three high quality rod makers, and like cheeler says the Beulah will be less expensive than the other two.

The insurance company will probably just give you the book value of the vehicle. When I had a car totaled that's what they gave me. Make sure you know what the black book value on it is when you start dealing with them. Either go into a dealership and explain why you want the book value (doesn't hurt if you make them think you're going to spend the insurance money there) and they'll probably give it to you. Otherwise, if you go to toyota.ca and price a vehicle there's a link at the bottom to appraise your trade-in. That takes you to the Canadian black book site and will give you the book value on your vehicle.

If you can wait until April maybe it would be best to take Gordon's (Speyghillie) course. He said that he'll have a variety of sticks and lines with him. That way you can try out some different lines and rod actions to see which you prefer. If you don't want to wait that long, the Beulah rods with Elixir lines are pretty forgiving I've found. I've had a couple days on the water with mine and zero frustration so far. You might also want to pick up a book like Simon Gawesworth's Spey Casting (Fish Tales and Westwinds carry it). Lots of big, clear pictures and he also covers a bit of Scandi and Skagit stuff. There are also some good videos out like Rio's Modern Spey Casting. As for reels, from one novice to another, make sure it has lots of capacity. These lines have way more diameter than what you're used to with a single-handed rod. If you think a reel is big enough, it probably isn't (a lesson I learned the hard way) and if you think it's a bit too big, it's probably just right. I put my Elixir 6/7 line on a Nautilus 10 reel and that only gives me 200 yds of 20# backing. The Loop CLW 8thirteen is a decent high capacity reel for a reasonable price and has enough capacity for most lines.

Heh, I didn't even think about that. I was so hung up on thinking about using false casts to feed out line with the single handed rod. Thanks Max.

Typically when I'm mending line on the two hander and strip in the slack line I end up stripping part of the belly (ie. the load point) back into the rod. From experience I know this makes it difficult to make the next cast properly. So what's the best way to get the load point back out of the guides? Let the current pull the line back out at the bottom of the swing? My casting ability isn't advanced enough to let me shoot sufficient running line so that this wouldn't be an issue. Plus, I can see cases where you're fishing a little closer in so that you wouldn't want to shoot much line.

I've found with a lot of the $1 flies I've bought from local stores that they fall apart after one or two fish whereas $2 flies will survive five or more fish easily. I don't have any experience with Icky, Glenbow, or any other online sources.

You could try putting some wax on the male end. If it isn't too loose that would probably help. But if the problem is that the sleeve has loosened this would probably just be a stopgap, since the sleeve would just loosen some more over time. Like Glenbow said, you should probably talk to one of the rod builders on the forum like Colin (CDone).