Tongariro Roll Cast Revisited

Here is a much better video I found recently on the Tongariro roll cast. The Tongariro roll cast appears to have developed independently of the the Perry Poke but they are functionally the same.  It was developed in the Hydro pool of the New Zealand Tongariro river to effectively deliver heavy nymphs/bombs a good distance with little back cast room. For those who are interested, I found a detail write up of this cast here.

In still water spey casting, I face a similar challenge when trying to cast big water-pushing bait-fish flies with small switch rod set up. These flies tend to stick to the water like glue when you let it get a chance to sit too long in the water. Drawing from the inspiration of the Tongariro roll cast, Perry Poke and the Snap-T, I came up with a cast that I named Snap Poke. By combining the Snap-T with the Poke in one movement, the fly essentially never get a chance to sink much before it gets fired off. This way, I managed to cast pretty big flies with light 4/5 weight switch rod. I recently remade my Snap Poke video in slow motion and posted on Youtube as below.  Snap Poke is good choice when using floating Skagit head. For intermediate sink Skagit head, Speed Poke will be a better choice.

The Snap Poke

I recently came up with this cast when I wanted a faster the way to do the poke so that my bulky heavy  fly does not get a chance to sink too deep before the forward delivery. The inspiration for this cast came from the Tongariro Roll Cast and the Snap-T. 

In lake fishing, some of the bulky baitfish pattern that I was using simply proved too challenging to extract from the water once they are sunk more than a few inches below the surface. Instead of using a heavier setup, I find that as long as I can get the fly to stay very near the surface before the forward cast, I will have no problem casting them.... hence a faster poke is born. The snap move allows the poke to be perform almost simultaneously with the pull back stroke. This cuts the time of the poke almost in half. The Snap Poke is typically performed after a roll cast to surface the fly.