Huck Finn Rod – Fly Fishing with a Willow Branch

Making a fly fishing rod from a branch
Ever get to the river and discover that you don’t have a fly fishing rod? If you are diehard dead set on making a day of a fishing trip, you could Mcgyver a rod! This rod shown in the images was a rod made several years ago in a situation where the rods vanished. I am not sue the exact story behind this rod, so I won’t turn this into a fiction piece by making one up. Randy Berry was the owner of Teton Valley Lodge, a fly fishing outfitter in South East Idaho. He unfortunately passed away almost 2 years ago, the operation is now being run by Matt and Brian Berry in Driggs.

This rod was created with the tabs on the top of pop cans, a tree branch of some sort and some electrical tape, a mandatory item in every fly fishing boat.  It now resides on the wall at the lodge with the small bronze adornment shown above. I think the story went something like this:

The fisherman Bill Smith an Randy Berry left for a normal day on the trout stream. Each day before a guide trip there is a usual routine; it involved a pre trip check to make sure all gear is brought along. One thing that is almost never forgotten is a backup fly rod. They are known to break when you need them most. Anyway Bill thought he had an extra rod with him that day, so everything seemed to be in order. The sage rod he had ended up on the bottom of the south fork of the snake river. Digging through the boat did not turn up a spare rod, but Randy did find a reel with line on it. So they crafted the rod out of all available materials at the time. They did actually hook a bunch more fish that day, and it turned out to be not that big of a deal to be using this home made flyrod.

A fishing rod made from tape, a stick and pop can tabs as guides.

Fly rod made from electrical tape and a stick