Otkud mušičarski štapovi?

Why custom fly rods?

    Po obrazovanju sam biolog, po nastavno-naučnom zvanju profesor i naučni savetnik-ihtiolog. Imao sam tu sreću da ceo radni vek radim ono što volim i zbog čega sam najviše i želeo da studiram biologiju. Iako sam se tokom karijere bavio mnogim stvarima (https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Predrag-Simonovic/research), zadnjih 25+ godina nastojao sam da mi i svet upoznamo pastrmke i druge salmonidne vrste Srbije. Sve to zbog ribolova od malena, koji je postao pre oko dvadeset pet godina isključivo mušičarenje. Jedan od najlepših izazova je mušičariti na novim rekama i uloviti novu vrstu ribe na njima. Naravno, prelep je interesantan dan na vodi pun dešavanja, ali svako ko tvrdi da veličina nije bitna, sumnjiv mi je.

By education, I am a Biologist, Professor and Principal Researcher-Ichthyologist. I’ve been fortunate to do during whole my career what I love and why I have chosen to study Biology. Although I have dealt with many things throughout my career (https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Predrag-Simonovic/research), for the last 25+ years I aimed to introduce the trout species of Serbia to ourselves and to the World. All because of fishing since the childhood, which became exclusively fly fishing about 25 years ago. One of the most beautiful temptations is to fly fish new streams and catch a new fish species in them. Of course, the interesting day on the water with plenty of events is excellent, but I am suspicious about ones who state that size doesn’t matter at all.

    Tokom godina mušičarenja, pojavila se potreba za određenim klasama i dužinama štapova. Na samostalnu izradu me je podstaklo teško i skupo dolaženje do kvalitetnih štapova po prihvatljivoj ceni, kao i komplikovan proces reklamacije kod nekih proizvođača. Neke greške ne mogu se izbeći-da su mogle, ne bi se desile, zar ne? Posebno kad je ribolov težak, a onda se javi na površini i samo da joj se brzo zabaci…

During years of fly fishing, the need for certain classes and lengths of rods appeared. The custom rod crafting was driven by cost of quality fly fishing rods at reasonable prices and difficulties in reclamation of breakage. Mistakes on the stream are sometimes inevitable – that is why they happen, right? Especially on slow fishing days, and suddenly a rise is there on the surface, a rush for casting is on… Whoops!

Do pre tridesetak godina teško se dolazilo do bilo kog dela mušičarske opreme, uključujući i štapove. Uglavnom su stizali iz inostranstva i vredeli su pravo bogatstvo. Verovatno je delimično i zbog toga broj mušičara bio relativno mali. Poslednjih dvadesetak godina, situacija se donekle menja nabolje, ali su cene kvalitetne opreme i potrošnog mušičarskog materijala bile visoke, pa su se mušičari uglavnom snalazili uz pomoć lovaca ili se dovijali za materijale koji su mogli poslužiti u vezivanju veštačkih mušica u ne-ribolovnim radnjama. Tada počinje i samogradnja mušičarskih štapova.

Until about three decades ago it was hard to get any kind of fly fishing equipment in-country, including fly fishing rods. They usually came from abroad, were worth a true wealth, and likely owing to that fly fishermen were relatively rare. In last twenty years, an availability of the fly fishing equipment and materials have improved somewhat, but prices of quality equipment were high, and fly fishermen mostly improvised relying on hunters and searching in a variety of non-angling shops for replacement materials they could use in tying of artificial flies. That was time when rod crafting has started, as well.

S godinama i promenama obaveza u profesionalnoj karijeri, počelo se „otvarati“ vreme u kome je pored mušičarenja bilo moguće baviti se i izradom štapova po sopstvenoj meri i potrebi, i igrati se izborom komponenti prema ličnim afinitetima. Na kraju, uz sve to, pokušao sam da napravim drvene umetke za držač mušičarskog čekrka od vrsta drveta iz našeg podneblja, kao i od nekih drugih retko korišćenih egzotičnih vrsta drveća, iz čiste radoznalosti. Ispostavilo se da je to interesantno i završilo se pravljenjem umetaka od različitih vrsta drveta (pogledajte zasebnu stranicu o tome).

With the age and changes of obligations in my professional career, a time „opened up“ in which a crafting of fly fishing rods with the components chosen according to own affinities was possible, in addition to fly fishing. Eventually, for pure curiosity, I have attempted to make the wood inserts for the fly rods’ reel seats of the tree species native to our climate, as well as of the exotic tree species rarely used for that purpose. It came out that all this is pretty interesting and ended in crafting the inserts of various tree species (see the distinct page about that).

    Izradom takvih štapova po ceni značajno manjoj od „preporučene maloprodajne“ dobrih fabričkih štapova sebi sam uštedeo dosta novca i prilično vremena i lutanja oko onoga što mi pričinjava uživanje-mušičarenja. Izrada dobrog štapa kojim još neko uživa pričinjava i meni zadovoljstvo.

By making such rods at prices remarkably less than the „recommended retail“ ones of good factory rods I’ve saved myself a lot of money, time and wandering, and had a plenty of joy in fly fishing with them. Making a good fly rod that someone else enjoys also pleases me.

Ovaj pristup mušičarenju posebno rađenim štapovima uz relativno mala ulaganja otvara nove mogućnosti, koje komercijalni proizvođači nekad ni ne mogu da pokriju. Posebno u zemlji sa pastrmskim rekama kakve ima Srbija. Stoga očekujem da će biti posebnih „projekata“ koje će inicirati mušičari, prema svojim potrebama.

This approach to fly fishing with the custom made fly fishing rods crafted with the relatively small investment opens new opportunities often inaccessible to commercial producers. Especially for fly fishermen in a country like Serbia, with the trout streams it has. Therefore, I expect in the future special projects initiated by fly fishermen according to their needs.