Dapping Long Rods With Don Miller

This week I'm in Idaho visiting Don Miller at his hideaway fishing camp at Pinehaven, Idaho. Don is a "dapper," a fly fisher who enjoys dapping (tipping) his special dry flies on the water using a 20-foot graphite rod built from a blank designed and made by the Babe Ruth of competition fly casting and G.Loomis rod designer Steve Rajeff.

Don is a hunter of big fish: He spends 90 percent of his time stealthily stalking them along brushy banks near backeddy pools and ten percent of it presenting the fly with just the tip section of the rod showing over the grass or brush. I'll have much more to say about this unique (and old) technique and the man who practices it when I get back.