Murph – Seeing where you’re from, I know the kind of streams you probably mean. Here’s my take…I fish these streams with either a 7’0 4wt or a 7’6 3 wt, both are overlined by one line weight in anticipation of the generally short casting distances you encounter on these streams. I prefer the 4wt, but it is a 2 piece. On longer hikes, backpacking, or streams that require a bike ride, I’ll take the 3wt – which is a 4 piece. I agree with some of the earlier posters that 7’6 is about the best middle ground on average for a legit small stream rod. You generally want to go with as long of a rod as possible on a given stream, without being too long to where a significant portion of your casts are being hampered by the length of the rod. A longer rod provides a longer lever and is easier to cast, and will allow you to keep more fly line off the water enabling better drifts – this can be important on small pocket water streams. At the same time you don’t want to be knocking your rod into trees or rhodo all day long either. There will be times on any small stream outing where you’ll want a shorter rod, and times where you’ll want a longer rod depending on the situation. IMO 7’6-ish is the best compromise length for most small streams. FWIW, I actually generally find that I’m wishing for a longer rod more frequently than a shorter one while fishing these kind of streams, but the times I want the shorter one seem to be a more significant issue with getting a cast to where I need it. There will be spots where they tighten up and spots were the open up…generally IMO the more open (and easier casting) spots outnumber the tighter spots. The ones that are legitimately really tight “rhodo tunnels” would be tough (if not impossible) to fish with any length rod.