Sturgeon love today - 4/8 (Sat)

If you send a picture of the sturgeon and the kayak, I bet they replace it.

good luck eye!

Erik, when you say 45-60 degrees, you are referring to the bend in the blank or the angle of the butt with the water/boat?
Pat

Pat... this is a little bit subjective and people differ a bit in their idea of what high-sticking really is.  Some manufacturers (like Lamiglas for one) give the rod it's maximum line rating based on the  performance with the rod at a 45 degree angle relative to the ground, or water with the load pulling straight down from the tip. What this means is that with the rod at a  45 degree angle, the maximum rated line should break before the rod does... but at an angle of higher than 45 degrees relative to the ground or water the rod may break before the line does. As this angle gets higher and higher the amount of load that the rod will tolerate drops because the stress on the rod is distributed over a shorter and shorter section of the rod and on the narrower section of the rod that has less strength.  This type of test seems to have a good deal of room for error built in to it.

Other companies, like Berkeley, used to advertise "no ninety"... which meant not to put the rod butt more than 90 degrees relative to the line (i.e. the imaginary line extending from the tip of the rod makes an angle greater than 90 degrees to the fishing line).  I guess when I think about it, this concept is probably the easiest explanation.

It all boils down to this (which is common sense if you think about it)... if the angle between the line and the rod is any more than 90 degrees, you are no longer putting maximum force on the fish, but rather are putting an increasingly high load on an increasingly weaker portion of the rod blank.   As the load (hopefully a fish) gets closer and closer, the tolerance for high-sticking decreases since the load is closer and closer to the rod tip. 

Hope that clears it up.

Great set of explanations, Erik

So, what does one do to safely bring the fish alongside for netting.........wait until he is tired?

Pat