The Eclectic Bear: Gathering

Opening Evening

The weekend after Labor Day, I attended the 2017 Catskill Rodmakers Gathering. This is one of the largest annual gatherings of folks that build, use, swap and sell split cane fly rods and related tackle in the US. This was obviously a highly focused affair, and as a neophyte rod maker I absorbed more useful technical stuff in a couple days than I have in a couple years.

But that’s not what I want to talk about.

The real show wasn’t the tackle, or the amazing rod shop at the Catskill Flyfishing Center and Museum, or even the lovely Willowemoc and Beaverkill Valleys. As is often the case, it was the people. I thought I’d share some brief observations on the rodmakers, and some snapshots and video that I snapped while I was there.

The demographic is superficially about what you’d expect, mostly white men with hair my color, but that only scratches the surface. The crowd, some 120 or so folks, is a real mix of iconoclasts and traditionalists, old military and old hippies, carpenters, engineers, software entrepreneurs, musicians, mechanics, trout bums and one-percenters, cranks, philosophers, and great wits. There were folks from all over the Northeast and Middle Atlantic, the Southeast, Canada, and some representatives from the West and a couple other continents too. Among all those white shocks of hair and beards, there was a smattering of younger faces and even a few people with X chromosomes. They all seem to know and like each other and the glue that binds them is a love of craft that reaches back to the mid-19th century.

Let’s face it: you don’t have to build and/or fish with a cane rod in the 21st century. You want to.

For all these folks, it matters that the craft doesn’t die, and that the tradition continues. While the tradition unites them, some of them are pushing it in all sorts of interesting, even astonishing, directions, while others pay careful homage to the masters and to the tried and proven. It’s a lot like blues or jazz music: there’s a solid structure that defines it, but in no way limits it. These folks, most of whom are only part timers and many of whom rarely or never sell their work, are probably building the most beautiful and functional bamboo fly rods that have ever been made.

Woods and water also unite them. There was lots of talk of trout, steelhead and salmon, stripers and bonefish, smallmouth and bluegills, of rivers and ponds close by and on the other side of the world. Many of these folks live and have their shops in rural and/or wild little corners of the world.

They all fish a lot, nothin wrong with that.

I heard a lot of strong opinions about everything having to do with cane rod building and use. Some of these opinions were welded into immutable and time-tested dogma, usually the result of decades in the craft. Other folks seemed to always be searching for a new and better way. Everyone seemed to be interested in everyone else’s process and tricks, and there was broad generosity of spirit in the free sharing of techniques, sources, ideas, and materials.

My impressions keep returning to tradition: the beautiful rods, the lovely old reels and other tackle, the easy grace of fly casting, campfire smoke, the feel of dawn along a little river that’s been fished for generations. A balance of pragmatic craft and painstaking art, and often great beauty, permeated much of what I saw and heard. There was a feeling of timelessness and of welcome. I’m sure I’ll go back.

Here's some Pix: