Years ago, I picked up a worn-out 9′ 7-weight 2-piece Winston, with a four-digit serial number that pegged it as a Fisher-rolled, pre-IM6 stick. In layman’s terms, it’s an extremely light rod, with an action similar to the vaunted IM6 rods, but in a slightly collectible configuration.
The rod was missing the hook keeper, the tip section had been replaced at one point, and the cork grip had seen better days. I didn’t feel like I was fishing with something with something too valuable to see the water, so I hauled it along for some early-season fishing.
Loaded with a double-taper Cortland 444 peach line, this 7-weight behaved a lot more like today’s sixes, but with more of a dry fly soul than you’d expect. If I needed to toss small dries at fishing rising to midges, the rod did it fairly well, especially with that double-taper line and a long leader. Conversely, I could turn around and fish a size 4 streamer on a sink-tip, and the rod responded admirably. It wouldn’t be my first choice for small dry fly fishing, but the fact this 7-weight could do it mattered more than anything.
I’ve since picked up a mint-condition 9′ 7-weight IM6, as well as a modern 7-weight Winston that’s a great streamer stick. Of all my fishing buddies, I’m the only one I know who consistently fishes a 7-weight, let alone owns three of them.
Well, make that four, because I just bought another one with bass fishing in mind. Since learning to love chasing bass on a fly rod, I wanted something with more guts and backbone than most of my 6-weights, but with enough feel to handle smaller fish, and the smaller bass flies. An 8-weight feels like too much, especially here in the Rockies where we don’t grow trophy bass. I settled on a 7-weight Hardy Marksman, a rod I fished in the saltwater and I’m sure will do great work to bass once it shows up.
I have a theory that the 7-weights of yesteryear – say, the rods made up until the mid-90’s – were more akin to what we think of as a 6-weight today. That was before line weights started stretching the truth of their official rating from the factory, and back when double-taper lines were still common on fly shop shelves. Based on a lot of the vintage bamboo and graphite I’ve had the chance to cast, most of the older 6-weights feel like a modern 5, and the 7s all feel like today’s 6-weights.
This is just one person’s opinion, and it’s slanted heavily towards 7-weights from a maker known for dry fly rods. But even setting aside the potential virtues of older 7-weights as hopper-dropper or single-dry fly rods, I’m surprised they don’t get more love from streamer junkies.
My most modern 7-weight – other than that Hardy – is a Winston Nexus, a short-lived all-graphite rod built in the USA but finished black and with cheaper hardware than their top-of-the-line stuff. I think I paid $575 for it, and it’s a great rod when loaded up with a sink-tip, or similar aggressively-tapered line. It has served me well on more streamer trips than I can count.
I had the chance to fish Winston’s 9’6″ 7-weight Air 2 a couple summers ago in Alaska, and it did great hauling in sockeye salmon. These rods are stronger than you’d expect, but have a bit more feel and delicacy than 8-weights.
And it’s not just streamers where I think modern 7-weights excel. I have a hunch that my new Hardy Marksman will be a great boat rod for throwing larger hopper-dropper rigs, especially when I’m fishing from a drift boat. The extra beef of a 7-weight will, if nothing else, help land the fish more quickly, a top concern in today’s world of rapidly warming rivers.
Most folks I know who are looking for big-fish/big-water rods make the jump to an 8-weight, which I’ve always found overkill for anything that’s not bass, pike, or some saltwater. Quite a few anglers I know, though, throw 8-weights at Pyramid Lake. Granted, they have the chance to catch 20-pound cutthroat trout there, yet I can’t help but wonder if the 7-weight would do just as good a job, but give you a bit more feel when stripping popcorn beetles past wary fish. We seem to have forgotten that, even with large flies and fish, feel and feedback is important.
That’s why my 8-weight gathers dust unless I’m off to Alaska, headed back to Florida, or in search of bigger predatory fish. My 6-weights see plenty of work during hopper and dry-dropper season, but I find myself reaching for 7-weights more and more as I fish streamers, large nymph rigs, or simply want some extra help battling Wyoming’s endless wind.
In the end, it doesn’t matter what rod you use, so long as you hook and land the fish ethically. There’s something to be said for having the right tool for the job, though, and in many cases, I think the 7-weight is criminally overlooked.