The sad passing of a local fixture and a good freind....
April 18, 2001:

Monday morning I was given the saddest news I've had to bear in a long, long time. Some time during the night Johnny Byrne passed away. No one is more responsible for showing me the ropes in saltwater fly fishing than Johnny. He was a friend of over 15 years, a local fixture at the beaches, jetties, and rivers. A fellow Shark River Surf Angler. One half of the now defunct J&J Tackle...the good half. Johnny devoted much of himself to the functioning of the Shark River Surf Anglers and if there was only 5 guys at a meeting, he was there. A very knowledgeable fisherman, a good friend, fellow club member, a mentor, a father, a husband and a good friend to so many...he will be sorely missed. The world will be a different place without Johnny Byrne and my heart and prayers go out to his family and many friends. He was truly one of the good guys and his face is one that I will miss seeing in so many of the places I fish. God bless and keep you Johnny, may you find the perfect surf in every corner of heaven.....

**For those of you who wish to pay your respects to Johnny Byrne, the viewing will be at Reilly's Funeral Home in Belmar, NJ on Thursday 4/19 from 2pm-4pm and again from 7pm-9pm. The funeral will be held at 10am on Friday 4/20 at St. Rose Church, also in Belmar.

Forum Leader, master rod builder, talented fisherman, and just plain nice guy Al Goldberg, who blesses us daily with his excellent advice and insight on the Rod Building Forum Forum here has begun a series of articles for StripersOnline on building that perfect custom rod! His first part, Choosing the Blank, is up now and he tells me part 2 is right around the corner! Many, many thanks to Al, he's responsible for getting me started wrapping rods for myself...and he probably doesn't even know it ;-) I learned from a teacher in 5th grade....and took a 25 year hiatus from wrapping. It was through reading Al's forum here that I realized it is not such an overwhelming and daunting task when you have a professional like Mr. Goldberg nearby to bounce questions off! Thanks Al for doing such a wonderful job on your forum and now for putting many of those thoughts into an article format for everyone to enjoy! So when we goin' fishin'?

If anyone is having problems either reading or posting on SurfTalk, please shoot me an email! There has recently been a confirmed problem with AOL and a Windows 98 file. AOL has (supposedly) got the fix for it, I am waiting for one of the two guys with this problem to get back to me and let me know if it works!

That's pretty much it, I haven't had a chance to get out fishing....yet! But my friends, that time is fast approaching, with all these 50 degree days, this will be the week that the fishing starts in earnest!?!?! Can I be the first to note that I certainly won't miss this past winter one single bit?!!?! The next page I write is going to center around the Salty Dogs of War, a grass roots "save the bunker" type group born right here on the board. There's a whole lot to be said about the goings on with the reduction boats raping NJ's waters of bunker and providing absolutely zero benefit to our state! The Dogs are on the case! Just a note for you commercial fellers that I'm told read this page, this really isn't about you even one bit. Whilst I do detest the blind and mindless gill netting of every swimming thing that tries to navigate our nearshore waters, you guys are off the hook on this one ;-) This battle is actually aimed to benefit the bunker bait boats as the removal of the out of state reduction boats will leave you with that many more bunker you can harvest...the sad thing is how many weakfish, stripers, bluefish, and other critters you will kill doing it! Ooops...there I go again, getting all off track and everything. The focus of the Dogs is to remove all the reduction boats from our state waters once and for all! One would seriously have to question the morals of a state government (like NJ's) that would allow huge reduction boats with 12 foot in diameter pumps and hoses to remove many millions of pounds of bunker from state waters with absolutely zero economic or otherwise benefit to NJ!?!? Kinda stinks of corruption or "pocket lining" but that's a whole nother story

The Lamiglas Rod & Blanks pages are really making their appearances now! So far, the following Lamiglas Rod pages are up: Surf & Jetty Rods, Ron Arra Signature Series Rods, Inshore Classic Rods, Braided Line "Tri-Flex" Rods, Boat & Pier Rods, and the wonderful Graphite Poppin' Rods! Whew, that's a whole lotta Lami's to choose from...and there's more coming! Also, for a limited time,if you purchase of a factory Ron Arra series rod, we'regoing to throw in Ron Arra's video, Distance Casting and Surf Fishing! What's that? You already have that video? Then I'll let you swap it for any one of the most excellent videos we offer here from Laptew Productions! All you have to do is pay the $5.95 for Priority Mail shipping and the video is yours, just for purchasing one of the premier surf rods being manufactured today. How's that for a deal? I knew you'd like it :-)

Sincerely,

Tim Surgent