B&M BW3

Like most folks, I generally fish with a spinning reel, spincast reel, or a baitcaster for bass and pickerel. The Black Widow is my first experience with cane pole fishing. I find the lightweight convenience and simplicity just terrific. Pulled a number of bream and crappie out of the pond with this rod so far. I'm not really sure why I would need to bring my spinning setup now I have the "cane pole." I mean, yeah, the spinning setup will cast much farther, but I'm catching more or less the same number of bream with the Black Widow, so it's getting me to rethink things.I rig it up with about six feet of some left over braided Dacron fly backing, wrapped around the tip section about 10" and affixed with a spot of electrical tape, then through the tip loop. I use a couple of simple loop knots to tie on enough mono to bring the total length of line from the tip to about 12". I tie on an Eagle Claw cricket hook, or some other long-shank #6 hook, then on goes the float and enough split shot to cock the float and sink the line gently, so the presentation is natural.As it stands, I consider myself a convert to the simplicity of float fishing from a fixed line for bream and yellow perch. Even though the angler just sits waiting for bobber movement, when the little fish does strike, this rod affords a lively fight. Just let the rod do the work without trying to pull the fish out of heavy cover as with bass fishing. I've never done much float fishing, but now I'm checking out YouTube vids on the finer points. Kinda nice to be learning about a fishing style that's new to me.I've seen folks using these rods for small stream trout, so that's next on the agenda. This cane pole setup does seem like it would be good for drift fishing a creek. I'm considering buying the 13' or 16.5' model to get a little more cast. I mean, at around $15, the 10' Black Widow is the price of a small spool of decent line. Can't beat it.

First time out my 6 year old caught 23 fish on this within an hour and a half. Sure we put a tiny hook and float on and she pulled up tiny fish (which is what we were aiming for) but boy was she excited.

Rod was extended rapidly, locking the extensions in place. I could not collapse it by hand as one would normally do so I added a buffer of tape for grip and tried twisting and pushing two sections to collapse them back into place. The pressure fractured the fiberglass. This is my first telescopic rod so I was unfamiliar with any protocol that would tell you to extend the rods carefully.

Have owned many of these over the years and the quality has certainly declined. Would hesitate to recommend this item to anyone else.

Kids had a blast with these, caught several blue gill and a few catfish

My 7 year old has pulled in tons of fish with this “purple pole.” He even caught a decent sized bass with it yesterday! He won’t even share, and always claims this pole when we go fishing. He caught blue gill, perch, and bass this week.

I thought you could use them for the different lengths of extensions but it only goes to the 10 foot extension but good product for what it is

This pole broke on the second fish (bream) I hooked and isn’t very durable