THE 4X EXPERIMENT

July 25, 2003 - The age old question pertaining to the summer stripers that have taken up residence on the barely navigable flats of South Beach and North Monomoy Island seems to be… Are they really that leader shy? In an attempt to pacify my inert curiosity, I decided to conduct a little experiment. Provided the predicted S-SW (5-10 mph) breeze would cooperate, I would substitute the beloved 9wt, my customary tool of ignorance when prospecting these hallowed grounds, with my seldom utilized 8 wt. I was confident in my ability to get reacquainted with the petite instrument and after an abbreviated dress rehearsal I felt good to go.

Step 2 of the experiment would involve leader construction. My customary leader configuration of 33lb butt, 22lb mid, and 13.2lb (or 20lb Mirage fluoro, similar diameter) tippet would be replaced by a traditional 9' extruded trout leader of .007 (4X) diameter. To this would be attached a 3 foot fragment of 4X RIO Fluoroflex Plus ultimately resulting in a 12 foot leader. This does sound like an ambitious undertaking but consider the fact that today's premium 4X trout leader tests out at 6.4 pounds and fluoro tests out at 7, I was assured of it's ability to subdue a portly specimen should I be fortunate enough to engage one. Another consideration would be leader turnover, but since the largest pattern I planned to utilize during the duration of my session was a #4, I felt that it would not be an issue, and it wasn't.

The final and most consequential element of concern was would the leader be resilient enough to sustain the brunt of the initial strike. Since my habitual routine is to gently twitch or coax offerings in lieu of the more traditional strip-pause-strip-pause technique, I was totally self-assured that it would.
In the course of the day's events I was delighted to entice 4 specimens to my offerings. All, with the exception of 1, were duped by #6 baitfish and shrimp replicas, the largest of which was a measured 34" brute. Since there is no dominant structure to contend with, only miles of pristine sand flats, the behemoth was restrained after a mere 5-7 minute conflict.

The final analysis of this exercise is mere conjecture. Did I think that the leader performed admirably under the demanding and highly technical conditions that exist within this fishery during the summer? Since previous outings have yielded similar results with similar flies I am not convinced it made the difference between success and failure. On only one occasion was I able to convince a cruising "single" to eat.
I will continue to pursue this experiment throughout the balance of the summer in the hopes of improving my success rate.

SUBSTANTIATED RUMORS
In a press release issued to all Sage dealers…
The Sage Rod Company of Bainbridge Island, Washington announced this morning that they have acquired the Redington Tackle Company of Stuart, Florida.

In acknowledging rumors that have been circulating for several weeks, Sage today confirmed that they have acquired the assets of Redington Tackle Company. Sage also disclosed that as part of the restructuring of Redington, they would be closing the Stuart, Florida location and consolidating the operation in Sage's Bainbridge Island, Washington facility. The Redington brand, however, is to remain distinct from Sage and will operate largely on its own footing.

"Where it makes sense to do so we will combine operations, primarily in the accounting, ordering and shipping arenas," said Travis Campbell, Sage's Manager of Business Development who will initially oversee the entire Redington operation, "and we should be in place and running here at Sage by August 11th."

Other key developments in regard to the acquisition include the following:

*****John Grippi, longtime Redington Operations Manager, will move to Bainbridge Island to continue in his role with Redington. "We're extremely pleased that John is coming along with the deal" continued Sage's Campbell "as in the short term he'll provide us with excellent input during the
transition period and in the long term he will remain one of Redington's key managers."

*****All order entry, accounts payable and receivable, returns, warranty claims and shipping will take place out of Sage's facility and the new contact number for Redington will be 1-866-498-7243.

*****The acquisition includes only the assets of Redington Tackle Company and does not, at this time, include Redington apparel.

*****The two brands, Sage and Redington, will remain distinct. "We strongly want to emphasize that it is our intent," says Sage's President Bruce Kirschner, "to keep a firm firewall in place between Sage and Redington. Sage will continue to do what Sage does best--high end specialty products sold through specialty retail channels--while we pare down Redington's product offering to middle and lower end price points and focus it squarely on broader distribution. We think that is precisely what the market wants at this time."

Good fishing and safe wading,
JB