Good morning!

Just back from a long and amazing weekend in the Catskills with 125 cane rodmakers and rodmaking enthusiasts, so trying to shift gears leaves me a bit stumped... hmmm... changes.... nothing comes readily to mind that I haven't posted here over the years. The collective creative wisdom on FAOL and the British furled leader board is amazing. Some day, I may add on to the dvd a demo of a couple ways to make the Shorb knot, as well as using tippet rings, and maybe how to adjust the weight and size of the leader...

The dvd was intended to democratize the process - make it available to one and all - and to be a jumping off point. I think, personally, for my own leaders, I've refined my making to smooth out the furls in the end-loops, say, or to adapt to new fishing situations (weighted streamers in big Labrador rapids, trico fishing, or large mouth bass in my Dad's weedy farm pond), and treating the leaders, etc., but I don't personally "jump off" very far from the simple process very often

At the Catskills gathering, I did get a chance to fiddle around a bit with Juris' automatic furled leader maker (FAOLers from the Chicago area have probably seen it in action). It's a cleverly made programable device (CNC furling?) which, of course, still requires hand-stringing initially, and seems to save only the time with hands on the drill (substituting near-exact duplication in production for hand-felt detailing). I applaud the effort, but won't be engineering one any time soon! Wish I'd taken pics to share here.

Kat