Trout rods

Remember that these were all single-handed rods!

Gould.-A hollow cane rod, with ash butt, twelve feet eight inches long; weight, thirteen ounces twelve drams.

Cheek.-A common hickory rod, of the usual make, rather stout in the butt, but very handy and well balanced, eleven feet seven inches long; weight, fourteen ounces six drams.

Bowness.-Ordinary hickory rod, rather light and whippy, eleven feet eight inches long; weight, thirteen ounces four drams.

Aldred.- This is one of the glued-up triangular-spliced rods, that is, the joints consist of three long pieces of bamboo cane, carefully fitted, glued-up, and tied every inch and a half. This rod, though a beautiful specimen of workmanship, is rather tiring on the arm, being a little top-heavy, and lacking the free spring of the last two, though it has great power of resistance with a heavy fish. Length, twelve feet four and a half inches; weight, thirteen ounces eight drams.

These were heavy beasts, even for the day, and represent the old school of fly rods. Some idea of Francis' attitude can be got from his idea of a good length for a double-handed trout rod - which was fourteen foot six, a rod that even Cotton would have recognised! This would have been a longish rod for angler to use at the time. It wasn't that light rods were not available. Wade, the secretary of the Wear Valley Angling Association, mentions wading for trout with a 'three-pieced splice-rod, only eleven feet in length, its weight being eight ounces'. Light rods built in the traitional materials were available, for example Wade had a four piece, eleven foot four inch trout rod that weighed a mere five and a half ounces.

Salmon rods

1. A four-jointed ferruled rod made of hickory by Farlow, 16 feet 7 ½ inches long, weight 2 pounds 6 oz.

2. An eighteen foot 3 inch hickory rod made by Bowness and Chevalier, weight 3 ¼ pounds.

3. An eighteen foot greenheart rod with ferrules, weight 2 pounds 10 ozs.

4. A nineteen foot ferruled rod with a hickory butt, the rest greenheart, weight 2 pounds 9 ozs.

5. A nineteen foot all greenheart, ferruled rod, weight 3 pounds,

6. A twenty foot all greenheart, spliced rod, weight two ounds 13 ozs.