| 

No Muskies Were Harmed in the Making of This Rod!

Category: article

 Dec 7th, 2012 by OutdoorsFIRST 

Modified Dec 7th, 2012 at 12:00 AM

Founder of Migizi Rods, Vince Weirick, took interest in custom rod building early on in his life.  Over the past ten years, Vince took that interest and began cutting his teeth on smaller projects like wrapping replacement eyelets on his own gear in need of repair, balancing rod weights, modifying lengths and just about anything else you can come up with surrounding rod repair and enhancements.

 All those lead to his first creation – a jig pole for ice fishing to meet the length and specifications he sought and were hardly accommodated by retailers anywhere. Vince ordered a 4′ blank, a wood handle and the necessary hardware and manufactured a custom jig pole that really founded the corner stone to what has since become a full-time career.  Taking the step into this full-time career was originally an uphill battle learning all the tricks of the trade.  Fortunately for Vince, a great friend and mentor, as well as custom rod builder of 30 years, Jim Grandt, took him under his wing.

This ultimately enabled Vince to help create his very own line of high-end custom fishing rods.  His thinking is simple, really. Why go out and buy a mass manufactured rod with limited specifications when he could build his own with higher-grade hardware and dependable graphite or E-glass?

Like any profession in a skilled trade, tools are essential in getting the job done effectively and efficiently – fishing is no different. As a full-time professional guide, Vince’s equipment was put to the test every season. If something breaks then it must be fixed or replaced, and those are costs that can add up in a hurry throughout the year and plays a key figure in any guides earnings. As a remedy, Vince invested himself into designing and building rods that could live up to the beating they were given day in and day out while maintaining comfortability and sensitivity.

 It was this attention to detail that helped make for the best experience possible for the customer and less expense in repair and replacements for Vince.

When Vince decided to break away from his full-time guide service to focus his undivided attention solely on building his Migizi line of rods, he knew that to be successful in this business he would have to maintain the same level of quality in his products as he depends on himself. Vince literally handcrafts every rod that leaves his workshop and goes a step further by including lifetime warranties with every rod he sells. It is this sort of commitment and integrity that sold me when I began purchasing Migizi rods.

With the introduction of Vince’s very own Migizi line of rods comes versatility to not only species-specific rods, but style-specific rods for both fresh and salt water. There is literally nothing Vince doesn’t think of when he designs Migizi rods – from the reel seats on his trolling line, to the CNC machined Nitrite-coated stainless steel guides for maximum casting smoothness, each rod is the real deal. The vision behind each Migizi rod is that it will literally last you a lifetime and his warranty stands behind this vision. Knowing this will be a fishing rod you’ll use for countless hours of your life spent on the water, Vince goes a step further by enhancing any rod in the Migizi line-up with custom snakeskin wraps and exotic feather weaves to give you that touch of personality to your new weapon on the water.

In fact, one of Vince’s newest creations is sure to capture the attention of his musky fishermen clientele – the Mr. Toothy Rod. Inspired by some custom work Vince had originally seen done on some saltwater rods where shark teeth were actually incorporated into the rod, it only seemed right that he doctor up something similar on a Muskie rod.

This rod boasts 9’6″ of XH High Modulus graphite featuring Nitrite guides, AA-grade cork handle, a graphite reel seat, stainless tiptop and is decorated with an exotic feather weave along with 25 large and very real Muskie teeth! Don’t worry; no Muskies were harmed in the making of this rod. Over the course of Indiana’s 2012 game fish season, Vince reached out to friends in his local area asking that if they find an expired musky washed up on the shoreline or floating, to let him know so he could go out, locate the already deceased Muskie and literally pull the teeth. No one said it’s a pretty job, but you can be the judge as to just how pretty the finished product turned out.

In total, Vince was able to acquire teeth from three different muskies so far. Obviously this sort of custom work done on one of Vince’s Migizi rods is limited to Vince’s Muskie teeth inventory, so if the supply is short, get yourself on the waiting list now to ensure you get not only the best of the best in handcrafted Muskie rods on the market today, but an original piece of art that will literally have anyone who fishes with you asking to get a closer look.