This inventory was first published on 15 February 2021 and last updated on 1 July 2023. It includes later comments, including one explicitly dated 2022. It is a historical record of the collection, rather than a list of what we use today.
The rod list
Gamakatsu / LUXXE
- Yoihime Ten 54FL
- Yoihime Ten 61L
- Yoihime EX 51
- Yoihime EX 74L
- Yoihime Hana 74L
- EG X 89 — used for long-range ajing
34 / Thirty Four
- PSR-60 THE NEXT STAGE
- HSR-63 Version 3
- UBR-510 — two rods
- HSR-610
- HSR-610 Version 2
- BCR-560
VARIVAS
- 610S — three rods
- 63S
Evergreen
- Superior SPRS-63SL-S
Clear Blue
- Blue Magic 64 Exciter — two rods
MagnumCraft
- SM8320, titanium tip
TICT
- 55-ONE
Daiwa
- CN-79 LML — used for long-range ajing
- Emeraldas 88 — used for long-range ajing
- Gekkabijin 68L-S — an entry-level rod; I found its sensitivity a struggle
Yamaga Blanks
- 65TZ — my wife’s first ajing rod
- 82F — for float-rig ajing
My wife’s comment on the 65TZ: “I don’t use it now. Where the VARIVAS gives me thirty bites, this gives me one or two.”
Total: 27 rods.
Quantities and model labels follow the source. The Gekkabijin entry is grouped under Daiwa here; it appeared after the Yamaga Blanks entries in the original. The bite comparison is the wife’s personal observation.
The reels
- 18 Stella 1000SSSPG
- 19 Vanquish 1000SSSPG
- 20 Luvias 2000 S — three reels
- 20 Luvias 2500S XH — used with long-range rods
Tatula series
- Tatula 2000S-XH — seven reels
- Tatula 2500S — four reels
- Tatula 2500S-XH — five reels, used with long-range rods
I also still had reels from the early days. Surprisingly, they were still fairly new:
- Soare BB — five or six
- Gekkabijin — five or six
Favourites and changing impressions
The Gamakatsu LUXXE Yoihime Ten 54FL and 61L certainly had good sensitivity, though each had its quirks. I liked them.
The earlier Yoihime EX 51 had been one of my essential rods. It caught plenty of fish. By 2022, however, I was no longer taking it out.
The VARIVAS 610 was my wife’s number-one rod. We kept a new one in reserve, and I bought another in very good used condition for myself.
The Evergreen 63 Superior was very good too: a strong all-round performer. I lifted out a 34 cm fish with it without trouble.
I bought a Clear Blue Crystar 57. Hmm… At 84 g, it felt heavy for the ajing I was doing.
The same maker’s 64 Exciter was a little lighter, somewhere in the seventy-gram range, and well balanced. In fact, it was so easy to use and sensitive that we had two, one for my wife and one for me.
The TICT 55-ONE—and a 90 cm seabass
As for the TICT 55-ONE, it was very much a proper ajing rod. Sound and sensible. Unfortunately, by then I no longer found it very interesting.
Was that because it lacked a sharply defined character? Not only that. I felt that some of the other, more distinctive rods had also moved a little ahead in performance.
Of course, a strong character can make a rod harder to use. People are different; each will choose accordingly.
This rod was for our child, then twelve, who had been fishing since the age of four, tethered with a rope.
At nine, our child had hooked a very large seabass while jigging from a breakwater on Hinoshima. The struggle became too much, so I took over partway through.
At first, my wife said, “There’s rather a lot of fuss going on. Probably something about 30 cm, I imagine.”
Then something changed.
“But… this is… a big one.”
I was some distance away and was called over. We swapped.
Oh. This was… far too heavy.
After about ten minutes of working the fish, its body finally came close enough to see.
A trophy-sized seabass. 90 cm.
The original does not identify the rod used for the earlier 90 cm catch. The Crystar 57 appears in the commentary after the 27-rod inventory and has not been added to that stated total.
See also the rod list first published in 2022.
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