Maxcatch Gaze Fly Reel Review

 

    I ordered the Maxcatch Gaze fly reel about two months ago having never used any of their products. I wasn't really sure what to expect. But my initial impressions are good. So far I like the reel quite a bit. It is a budget fly reel, it sells for regularly $59.00. I got mine on sale for $53.00 off the Maxcatch website.

    First lets start with the reels specifications. I ordered the 6seven model. It comes in black only. Is rated for use on a 6/7 wt rod and has a spool capacity of 100 yards of 20lb fly line backing. The drag system is the MAX LDS which Maxcatch touts as a maintenance-free, fully sealed light weight drag system.

    The reel is made from a precision CNC and diecasting combined processing. It sports a large arbor design for quick line retrieval. The drag system has a stacked teflon drag disc that Maxcatch says offers big power with smooth performance. The drag system also offers quick opening for easy changes from left to right hand retrieve. 

    The outside diameter of the reel is 94 mm with an inside diameter of 52 mm and a weight of 139 grams. It is also listed a a fully waterproof reel and came with the nice carrying case seen below.

    So like I said earlier, my initial impressions are great! The reel is extremely light weight and reels very smoothly. The drag system is smooth and operates as advertised. I tested it on the river fishing for smallmouth bass. With some of the larger smallmouth I caught I got them on the reel for the fight to see how the drag system performed and it performed great! I had no worries about it sticking or maybe breaking my leader. The drag also ratchets up very tightly if you were going to use heavy leaders for big fish.

    The spool comes off and on with ease. And the reel seems very tight. Nothing, including the turning knob is loose at all. I have used other budge fly reels and they always seem a little loose in operation. Kind of how a new car seems tighter to drive than an old one. I also dunked the reel in the river many times throughout the day and found it to still operate smoothly.

    Now the one thing I cannot attest to is durability. I haven't used the reel enough to have an educated opinion on that. But I did fish it hard for about 7 hours the day I tested it. Stripping of line at many new holes and reeling in to change spots and it still stayed tight and smooth in operation throughout the day.

    Overall I really like the reel. I plan on using it as my primary reel for one of my sink tip lines. I think the reel is perfect size for any bass or trout fishing applications. And if you are in the market for a budget minded back up reel I think this reel would perform fantastic in that roll. So if you are in the market for a new reel, check out Maxcatch's website. I think they have good quality reels for the price. They also offer some of their other models of reels in some really cool colors if you are into that kind of thing. I hope this review helps out anyone considering purchasing a new reel. Or if you had seen some of Maxcatch's stuff and were wondering about the quality. Tight lines!

Spinning Gear vs Fly Rod

 

    There is a question out there in the fishing world, is spinning gear more effective than a fly rod or is it the other way around. Well, the honest answer to that question is it depends. It depends on a multitude of factors from the type of water being fished, depth the fish are at, water clarity, what are the fish feeding on, what type of fish are you after and the list goes on. But in my opinion as to which method is more effective is it depends on a day to day basis. Conditions and fish mood are always changing. I grew up lure fishing, and about 16 years ago I picked up fly fishing. And while I almost exclusively fly fish now, I do pick up the spinning rod every now and then

    Something I have often been asked is, "isn't it easier and more effective to fish nymphs on a spinning rod under a float vs a fly rod and indicator set up"? So having thought about this a lot and coming up with ideas in my head I finally decided to test it out and see for myself. My wife and I both fly fish and for this little experiment I had her spin fishing with me to get another point of view as well. We went to a river I had not fished in years, and I really did no research prior to going about what patterns are effective on this particular river. I just took the whole fly box and we went through them.

    First and foremost, does it work? Well as you can see from the picture above it does work. That fish was one of three rainbow trout we caught in about four hours of fishing along with a small bull trout. We were bouncing through various fly patterns though and had we went with prior knowledge of the hot patterns I think we could have caught more. But even though this method worked, it wasn't without its pitfalls and head aches.

    Our setup was fairly simple. We used 8ft ultra light trout rods with 8lb braided line.  A fixed float, the kind you use for steelhead fishing only down sized a bit. The float was attached to our braided main line. At the end of the braid was a barrel swivel (a barrel swivel prevents you from losing your float should you hang up). Under the barrel swivel we had 3ft of fluorocarbon leader (6-8 lb). On the business end of our leader we experimented with single and double fly set ups as well as a small split shot about 8 inches above the fly on a single fly rig and the top fly on a double.

    The first and really main issue was split shot placement. I tie my flies with tungsten bead heads, but to still get the flies down in a timely manner we used a split shot weight, similar to a fly fishing nymph rig. (It should be noted that the split shot also served to ensure our float rode upright). We started with the weight being placed directly under the barrel swivel. This kept our float upright, but depending on the depth we were fishing it didn't get our flies down quick enough and it tangled a great deal when casting! We finally found that placing the weight 6-8 inches above the fly worked better on all aspects of the rig including the tangling when casting. But it didn't eliminate it. We still got tangled about every fifth cast it seemed like.

    A pro to this set up was, if I wasn't tangling up I felt I could make more casts, more drifts and cover more water than with a fly rod and nymph rig. But again there are factors to this as well. A great fly caster could have covered almost as much water. However, he wouldn't have been able to fish the far side of the run or river like I could with the spinning rod.

    The second issue we encountered was the double fly set up. I tied them on the leader the same way I would when fly fishing. With two flies we seemed to get tangled up more casting than with just one. Where as fly fishing, this doesn't happen too often unless its a horrible cast. So the one fly set up was definitely the way to go and led to more time fishing.

    The third and last issue we found, was even though we were using ultra light floats made for small jigs in the 1/64 oz range, I still felt that we were missing bites. I think when fishing a fly rod with an indicator, you detect the more subtle bites and I don't think we were getting that with our float set up. Not every bite will sink the hole float or indicator.  I also felt I had to mend my line more with the braid and spinning rod then I do with fly line.

    So the conclusion to the experiment. Does it work? Absolutely! If you don't know how to fly fish but wanted to fish with nymphs this set up would be just what you want. However you will get tangled when casting. You can't whip it out there like if you were casting a spinner. You have to kind of lob it to keep the rig from tangling. Honestly this became a head ache after a while. So for me, it wasn't more effective than nymphing with a fly rod. If I had to fish this way in the future I would probably use tiny marabou jigs instead of flies. I think this would lead to less tangles and a more enjoyable experience.

    I hope this helps you guys out, or maybe even shorten the learning curve if you want to try it yourself. It did work, and even though it was a pain tangling up, it was still fishing and we were still catching fish which is always great! Tight lines!

John Day River Smallmouth

 

    The John Day River starts in eastern Oregon and runs northwest through the east side of central Oregon then turns north and flows all the way to the Columbia River. Steelhead fisherman know the John Day for it's steelhead runs, the river has one of the last remaining wild runs of steelhead not supplemented by hatchery fish in the lower 48. But once the temps rise in summer, the John Day is all about smallmouth bass. I grew up fishing the river for both steelhead and bass, but after a career in the military it had been quite a while since I prowled its waters. Good news is, the fishing seems as strong if not better than ever for bass. In most fly fishing circles, the John Day is a pretty well know bass fishery, especially to west coast guys. Its celebrity even reaches back east to the more famous smallmouth locations such as Virginia and New York. But you would be surprised how many people have no idea how good the fishing really is.

    Another thing not well known is that its more than just a fly fishing river. Sure in the summer its low and warm with large clear flat river rock banks so it sets up perfect for fly fishing, which is what we were doing on this day. But its a great fishery for gear guys as well. Hair jigs and small plastic grubs will net you a ton of fish in a day.

    Most people like to float the river. The standard float trip used to be around five days. But the BLM has recently purchased some new land thanks to a private fishing/conservation club so shorter trips are available now. Be aware though, a float permit is required through the BLM. But if a float trip in not in the cards, there are plenty of places to access the river by foot. The John Day is considered navigable as well, so can walk up and down the river to your hearts content and be legal. There are some deeper spots you would have to swim to cross, but its usually not to hard to find a riffle shallow enough to keep you dry above the knees.

    The fly fishing was excellent the day we were there. Mostly shallow water 5ft or less, so depending on what type of pattern you are using you can easily get away with a floating line, or intermediate. Although a sink tip of 10ft or less is very handy. I prefer to use a sink tip with either unweighted flies or ones that are slightly weighted. But I did fish alot this past trip with a floating line and a clouser minnow with medium size dumbbell eyes and could get down in pretty much all of the holes we fished.

    For patterns, we caught fish on just about everything. There was some cloud cover, so poppers worked most of the day. Various styles of woolly buggers and clouser minnows were our other go to patterns. I prefer to tie my patterns with a twist of some kind. So whether its a bugger or a clouser I always put my own twist on it. 

    As far as colors, the old standard chartreuse is hard to beat. Or any other color mixed with chartreuse for that matter. We also had success with pink and white and chartreuse and pink, or as its better known to salt water fisherman as "electric chicken". I experimented with olives, blacks and crawdad colors and caught fish on them all. But the brighter colors were by far more productive.

    Nymphing under an indicator and swinging flies will both catch you fish. But we found that stripping flies was far more productive. And the faster we stripped, the better it was. Most of the fish we caught were between 8-12 inches. But we did get into a few bigger guys in the deeper holes and there are plenty of trophy 20+ inch fish to be had. It just takes covering a lot of water to find the bigger guys. As far as number go, the John Day is know for 100 fish days! No really, its true. Now it wont be 100 fish 16 inches or bigger. Most are around 10 inches. But its hard to beat a fish almost every cast. I think my wife and I caught around 60 between the two of us on our last trip.

  The John Day is a great bass river and it fly fishes very well. So if you are ever in central or eastern Oregon and have a hankering for a bent rod and a 60 fish day, give it a try. Its not a technical river as far as the bass fishing goes. You wont need a "top secret" pattern in the exact size to get into fish. Its a great river for kids or the beginning fly fisherman or woman, plenty of fish eager to bite and plenty of room for a back cast. One thing to note about the river, its a pretty remote area and gets really hot in the summer. So make sure you have plenty of water and supplies as to stay safe. Good luck and tight lines!