samson - Fly Angler Australia

When big fish take flies with such ferocity so close to the boat yourgear and knots better be good.10long and hard in that direction. With full drag onyou strained just to hang onto the rod to keep thetip under the boat to stop it fatally bending aroundthe chine. Just to just get one hand free to backoff the drag was fraught with danger. There weremany white knuckled moments spent bent rightover the gunwales with bare toes barely grippingthe deck, moments that teetered on the edge ofa graphite-shattering disaster. We soon learned toback off the drag the instant they headed in thatdirection and this worked - sometimes. The needfor a serious big game lever drag fly reel suddenlybecame a reality.But we also won plenty of rounds. The bestfish of the trip was a massive samson Noddylanded. The crew declared it was the biggestthey’d seen landed on ANY tackle. Our estimateput it at over 100 old fashioned pounds, a trulyphenomenal capture on fly tackle and a testamentto Noddy’s great fishing skills honed over manyyears of subduing big fish on heavy fly rods. Agreat personal moment came when I busted offa fish on the 16 weight and picking up the 11weight because it was rigged, and landed a 25kilo samson. We landed others over 40 kilos andthe average size was somewhere around 25 kilos.That’s very, very serious fly fishing.Extreme polaroiding...issue oneaug-oct 06samsons