Good friend @Old406Kid is notifying the Spokane fly fishing clubs.
Found the owner of "FOUND: Fly rod, reel, line"
- Thread starter Buzzy
- Start date
I found one on the Deschutes one year. It was an Echo Ion XL or something like that in 5 or 6wt with a cheap Echo reel. Despite the rod tip sticking out of the water it had been there for at least a few weeks. Current may have moved it that day. It had, big surprise, a big purple Chubby tied to what must've been about 1x or 6# Max. Something thick. Chubby still in the hook keep.
I listed it on here to no avail. My buddy took it home to Eugene with him and told Caddis Fly shop about it, but nobody turned up. He still has it. Actually uses the rod every now and then. I think he may have replaced the cork. We guessed it was a client rod that a guide was glad to see go.
The reel could not be salvaged. Full of gravel, silt and everything else. It rusted by the time he got home. RIP
Hope you find the owner!
I listed it on here to no avail. My buddy took it home to Eugene with him and told Caddis Fly shop about it, but nobody turned up. He still has it. Actually uses the rod every now and then. I think he may have replaced the cork. We guessed it was a client rod that a guide was glad to see go.
The reel could not be salvaged. Full of gravel, silt and everything else. It rusted by the time he got home. RIP
Hope you find the owner!
Bambooflyguy
Legend
I wonder how many “mine” if you posted it at the lake next time you fish there…..
You know? I thought about doing just that. Several years ago I went to Rocky Ford and found two (or was it three) fly boxes on the upper bridge. I debated: leave them alone or......... I ended up taking them home but I left notes taped to the bridge and vault toilet door (the outside, not the inside) with my phone number and a msg to call and identify the boxes. Lo and behold I got a phone call from the man who left them there. He'd driven back to get his fly boxes.
In the meantime: TTT (or back to pucker up)
Several ago I hooked a fly line on a lake up here in Canada and brought up the line and the rod and reel it was attached to. I wanted to find the owner so I reached out to the handful of lodges on the lake, and one of owners recalled a customer that had lost a rod a couple years prior but he hadn't been back due to Covid. She reached out to him, he reached out to me (he was from Olympia, WA) and sure enough it was his rig. It was a custom made rod from Arizona; he was heartbroken at the time to have lost it but super stoked to get it back. The best part was that he was heading back to the lake in a couple weeks time, and I live near the border, so the rod was back in his hands within a few weeks me having found it.
I would call the fly shops in Ellenburg and anywhere in the vicinity to see if someone mentioned a lost rod. They may not be on the fishing sites..
Maybe also contact the ladies of Soap Lake!!
Somone here probably has their contact info!! 
drifting upriver on my Clack with a buddy, we saw a king thrashing about under a tree by the bank...big fish with a plug in it's mouth, expensive level wind set-up snagged in tree roots. Got the rod, unpinned the fish and let it go. Getting ready to surf the next day, getting in my wetsuit talking to Elke, local surfer and river guide, tell him the story...turned out to be his rod. Fish had jerked it right out of his cients hands and headed upstream with it. Pulled the rod from the Tahoe and gave it to him..Elke was highly stoked having just gotten $600 in gear back.
Bambooflyguy
Legend
Pat, as flybill mentioned, the rod owner might not be on the fly sites. After a little more time and effort I’d say the statute of limitations runs out and you have a “new” rod. If so….hope it a nice set up! My .02
Well done Pat!
Sinking lines don't float ;-) (this one has a sinking line). Since the rod is hollow and hadn't been in the lake very long, there must have been enough buoyancy to keep the rod tip vertical (9' rod in 16' of water).
BriGuy
Life of the Party
Just curious, how did he learn that you found the rod?
I joined a Spacebook group yesterday and posted that I'd found a rod and to identify it. This morning he had notifed me, described it perfectly.
The wind came up, he laid the rod on the side of his pontoon and was rowing back when it slid off and sank.
Well done, Buzzy!
Is that part of the moon trip or the Spaceforce?
Bambooflyguy
Legend
That’s pretty amazing Pat! So did you tell him to either put some rod holding straps on his pontoon boat or join this site?? So what kind of rod/reel is it?
Cabelas LST, 690-2 with a Piscifun reel.