Making Changes

"Rich, you're a creature of habit. You never want to do anything differently," Donna often tells me.

Well, maybe, but there were some changes in the "tools" I used for fly-fishing and for turkey hunting this past year.

Last winter I bought two fly rods. One was a used rod to replace one I had returned to a fisherman who had sold it to me. This was going to be my big-water rod. The other was an expensive, new split-bamboo fly rod that was to take the place of an old small-stream rod that appeared to be wearing out.

The used rod did not last long. The second time I had it on the water, I wrapped...