Midwest Custom Fly Rods

A RainShadow 10'8" 5wt 4pc Switch rod built for fishing the "Trophy Waters" of the Au Sable river in Mio Michigan. Highly customized reel seat, alot of thread work on the wraps and a snake brand agate stripper make this one a complete stand out from the crowd.

 

 

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This 7 piece rod is known as the Traveler series offered by Midwest Custom Fly Rods. Amazingly this Travl;er series of rods like you see here can be purchased for only $139.00.

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One of the nicest Custom fly rods you will ever come across. From the carbon fiber woven Matrix blank to the hi tec looking reel seat with custom inscription and wraps over the rear hood to the smooth black wraps with multiple single turn trim bands this one just drips of custom built class.

 

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I had the honor of building this bamboo rod for one of (if not THE) most talented artistic salmonfly tiers in the world today...Bud Guidry of Louisiana. Bud has completely shocked the world over the past 3 years with his unbelievably amazing Artistic&Classic salmonflys. So when Bud contacted me about building him his dream cane fly rod I was very honored to be the builder Bud choose to make his dream come true.

The rod I built for him is a dickerson taper two tip hand split cane blank built by Robert Farrand of Birch Run Michigan. Robert splits the cane for his blanks himself and builds these magnificent looking cane blanks one at a time and his passion for cane shows in his work.  I will let the pictures speak for themselves on this beautiful cane rod that has a mix of new&old in its style.

 

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Super clean build on a 5wt Gatti G4 with custom turned exotic cork grip and and REC woven reel seat

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A baston 7'6" 3wt just loaded up with custom touches.

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This beautiful Switch Rod is built on a CTS 10' 7wt Golden Olive blank. It has a complete custom set of Copanza cork/rubberized cork, foam and plain cork grips on it. Amboyna burl real seat, and REC NSB Nickle Silver hardware are just a few of the nice touches done to this great looking&casting beauty!

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This rod is a Loomis GLX 13' float (aka- Cneterpin) rod. This blank is only offered as a completed factory rod so I was commissioned to totally strip the factory GLX rod down to nothing but the blank and rebuild it with all custom parts including custom exotic cork grips, Amboyan burl seat and butt. Struble hardware, Fuji titanium SIC guides, and even right down to matching the text used by Loomis to put their name back on the rod with a custom made decal I produced for this build.

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9' 4pc 7/8wt  built with a custom burned black ash burl reel seat, classic twist thread, with single turn trim bands on both inner&outer edges (something my rods have become known for) as well as many other custom touches. The pics can do the talking on this beautiful rod!

 

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This is a split cane rod built on a blank that was hand made for me by cane rod maker Robert Farrand of Michigan. The blank is a Lenard 39L taper and is the complete essence of what a cane rod should feel like with the smooth parabolic action. Features custom grip with maple accents on the fore&aft of the grip, agate stripper, and maple reel seat. Simply a dream to cast and is now at home in my own personal rod arsenal.

 

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A Snake themed UL spin rod called "Venom". Snakskin insert, classic twist green/black thread, custom grips, multiplue trim colors and a 22/250 modified shell case in the butt cap make it stand out from the rest.

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Couple of nice feather inlays done on a pair of 7/8wt rods which went to a customer in PA to be used on Lake Run browns and Steelhead in the fall.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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An 8' 6" 4wt CTS Affinity Plus resting on an old log after a day of fishing. This rod features a custom turned grip of exotic cork with a custom turned reel seat insert and REC NBS Nickle Silver hardware.

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A beautiful small stream rod. 6'6" CTS "Golden Olive" colored blank with Amboyna burl insert, REC hardware with custom thread accents on the hoods, Rust colored thread without CP. This reel seat insert is a prime example of how nice of a custom touch you can get with a custom build rod over a factory rod.

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A 9' 3piece 6wt GATTI G4 rod built for streamer fishing trout and smallmouth. This rod featured double contrasting color trim bands, aluminum winding cheack, removable fighting butt and a tiger maple insert reel seat.

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 This is a beautiful example of a truely custom rod. This rod now resides in the hands of an Atlantic Salmon angler in Canada. Its a 9' 9wt CTS Affinity Plus blank with double trim bands, two removable fighting butts, a full wells grip and many other detail orientied features to it. Simply a perfect looking rod.

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Another beautiful CTS rod. This one has many custom touching including the exotic cork custom grip and single turn trim bands which add a very classy touch.

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A custom built 10ft "drift" rod taking a break from catching steelhead on the banks of the Au Sable.

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 A great little small stream 3wt built on a Shakri blank for a very good returning customer.

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This Red White&Blue rod is a rod I donated to a solider who recently returned home from serving a tour with the USAF in Iraq. Just my way of saying "Thank you" for his service.

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A custom airbrushed reel seat I did on a panfish rod to mimic the look of a perch. I can do numerous seats in different looks such as this as well and some trout patterns if desired. Call for priceing.

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A beautiful 9' 5wt rod that went to a customer in NY to be used on some of the streams upstate. This rod featured a Rainforest blank(deep green color) with Green Stybalized wood reel seat and matching butt, Custom foam inlay cork grip, All gold hardware, green wraps with gold spiral wraps and tipping. Truely a "one of a kind" beauty of a rod that will set this customer apart from the store bought gang

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This dry fly rod is a 9' 3wt rod built on a Matrix Series blank. It features Jadewood insert and flor grade grip with Jadewood accents. Green wraps with black spiral overwraps and a holographic trout on the butt section, as well as feather inlays round out the look. These Matrix blanks case as well as they look. This rod is one of my own personal rods and for the money it is the smoothest casting rod I have built to date on a graphite blank.

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This beautiful "Streamer Rod" was built on a 9' 6wt Fly Logic slate gray blank.It features a beautiful hand turned insert, Struble hardware, and Royal blue wraps with metalic trim bands. A wonderful mid/tip flex rod for punching out big streamers on trout and bass rivers.

 

 

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This is a rod that was built and given away as a prize to the winner of the Warm water category of the "Fly tier of the year" contest on www.flytyingforum.com . The rod featured a 9' 5wt Pacific Bay forest green blank, Green wood reel seat insert, custom grip with green accent stripes, gold A5 hardware, and green wrap's tipped with gold. This rod went to the lucky winner who resides in Romania.

 

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Yet another high quality low cost rod for a happy angler. This one was built on a moderate fast action 9' 3/4wt Sevier "tiger eye" blank. It featured a Rosewood mortized reel seat insert, high grade reversed half wells grip with hidden fron hood, chesnut colored wraps to match the blank color, as well as silver trim bands and spiral decrotive wraps over the ferrule. This one went to an angler in Mexico that I'm sure will have some fun with this light little stick chasing the local trout and small bass with it.

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  This rod 5wt rod was build an a pac-bay green colored blank with brown wraps and gold trim which gave it a very classic "old style" look. The grain in the real seat and hidden front hood also added to the subtle classic look of the rod.

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This beautiful 6/7wt rod was build as a streamer rod for the customer. The owner of this rod wanted a rod that was not only a fast action 9' rod, but he also wanted the rod to have a very "classy" look to it that would set it apart from just an off the shelf rod, without being to "flashy". Sticking with the color scheme of the blank I did this one with black wraps and gold tipping, gold spiral wraps over the butt section framing, a feather inlay of Lady Amherst and Jungle Cock, as well as two Jungle Cock feathers for alignment marks. The finished product as you can see meet with the owners approval, and then some!

 

The alignment feathers.

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 This rod is a 9' 7wt forest green Pacific bay blank, with a green stabilized wood reel seat insert as well as green stabilized wood accents on the UB40 sealed cork full wells grip. This rod also features a gold stripper and tameing stripper along with it's gold snake eyes. A large number of wild Michigan and pennsylvania Steelhead have been subdued by this beautiful rod.

 

 

 

 

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This is a Sevier "Tiger eye" small stream rod. It is a very specialized rod since it is only 6ft long and a 2wt, and is perfect for those tight little 20ft wide streams where a small finese approach is required. It features single foot TI-CH eyes to save weight, a mortized darkwood seat, flip down hook keep, and scarlet wraps with silver trim bands finish off the eye poping look to this lil' guy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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.Here is an absolutly beautiful 10wt Matrix fly rod that would serve double duty as ethier a large salmon or saltwater rod. Built on a Matrix 9' 10wt blank with a Custom Snake Skin reel seat, Jungle Cock feather inlays, and classy looking chesnut wraps with tan accents

            

             

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  This rod was built on a Sevier Tiger eye 9' 3/4wt blank which features a mod/fast action. An ebony insert and grade "A" cork grip with recessed front hood adds to the beauty, and chrome Ti-CH single foot guides to keep the weight nice and light. Scarlet red wraps with silver trim and spiral over wraps as well as a holgraphic trout on the butt section add to the eye catching look of this rod.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Heres a 6/7wt Bass rod built on a Sevier blank with some custom detail work done to the reel seat to set the rod apart from the crowd. Feather inlays and silver trim bands round out the package.

 

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Smallmouth rod in a 9' 6/7wt blank. Chesnut wraps, silver trim and spiral wraps, ebony reel seat, feather inlays and a smallmouth on the insert make this rod a smallmout catching beauty.

 

 

 

 

 

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This 12'6" 7/8wt Spey rod was built for a customer in the PNW to be used on the Salmon&Steelhead rivers of the west coast. It was built on a Forecast 12'6" blank and featured a custom turned Mahogany insert, Maroon wraps with silver trim and full spey grip with foam butt.

 

 

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This Streamer rod was built on a blank that is now discountinued but can still be found at select few places. It's a 9' 7wt Pac Bay Traditional blank which is "Plum" in color. This one was done with "Wine" colored wraps to match the blank color and tipped with silver on the snake running guides. The grip is a custom grip with brown inlayed foam, has a custom insert and Struble hardware. The insert is the real eye catching feature of this rod as it is a insert I airbrushed to mimic the coloration of a Brown Trout skin. I offer this airbrushing on any inserts I use for a small fee.

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Rod built specificlly for a female angler.