the Underground’s recent post about Tenkara fishing – a Japanese form of fly fishing that uses a long pole, but no reel – elicited a lot of responses from the Undergrounders.
Some thought it looked like fun. Others seemed to think it was simply repackaged cane pole fishing – yet another scheme to part fly fishers with their undeserved hard-earned dollars.
Whatever the truth, Tenkara’s once again in the news, this time because of a Catskill event which found fly fishing legend Joan Wulff giving the technique a try. The Tenkara USA site’s blog (a commercial venture, so don’t expect objectivity) reported it thusly:
Saturday’s event was a day when “East met Westâ€, as participants witnessed the meeting of two giants in the world of fly-fishing, Dr. Ishigaki and Ms. Joan Wulff. Joan Wulff, one of the most recognized names in Western fly-fishing, tried her hand at casting with a tenkara rod, showing at once that tenkara fishing is no “cane-pole fishingâ€. She quickly adjusted to casting with a tenkara rod and formed a nice and tight loop, turning the line and fly over.
tries Tenkara (photo courtesy Tenkara USA)”]
Will Tenkara find a home in the USA? It’s hard to say.
As one Undergrounder commented, fly fishermen tend to embrace complexity the way Paris Hilton embraces undeserved publicity. Still, even if Tenkara doesn’t sweep through the industry (maybe if it had a more extreme name), the cross pollination of new ideas between sports is rarely a bad thing.
Plus, we’re always looking for an excuse to run a photograph of Underground Fave Parental Fly Fishing Icon Joan Wulff – the petite, grandmotherly appearing woman I instinctively offered to help when I saw her stringing up a fly rod, not stopping to think she might have accomplished the task 20 or 30 thousand times before.
See you slinking away in embarrassment, Tom Chandler.
More objectivity? http://www.dailygazette.com/news/2009/may/28/528_fly/
Theo Lance(Quote)
“the petite, grandmotherly appearing woman I instinctively offered to help when I saw her stringing up a fly rod, not stopping to think she might have accomplished the task 20 or 30 thousand times before.”
I can vouch for this – I have visual proof of Tom doing this. I think she was even wearing the same outfit. http://flyfishmagazine.blogspot.com/2008/09/ffr-show-2008.html
Murdock(Quote)
Theo: Thanks for the link.
Chivalry isn’t dead, but it’s possible too many of my brain cells are.
Tom Chandler(Quote)
I was thinking about tenkara the other day after fishing the local bluegill pond with my 4 year old. We bought wax worms, and I had two spinning reels rigged up. We could see our venerable opponents suck in the worm and then spit it out, we caught a few, but not as many as we should have. These fish are properly trained in the art of worm robbery.
I took an Elk Hair Caddis and tied it to the end of the 6 lb mono, and proceeded to do a bow an arrow cast. The fish went nuts for it, coming completely out of the water, we slayed them! I went home and thought man I should get a tankara rod for that!
If its good enough for a Wulff its good enough for me!
Ethan(Quote)
So I bought an outfit a few weeks ago and now have spent a couple of days on a spring creek with it. Observations:
1) The rod is nicely made and packaged, and the little glass vials with the flies are georgeous. 2) No, it won’t replace your regular outfit, but it’s a lot of fun. 3) Nymph fishing is deadly. 4) You won’ t have to lie about being able to cast a whole line 5) The soft tip makes it easy to miss strikes. Basically, if the fish does not hook itself you are SOL. There is probably a trick to this that I do not understand. 6) Fighting sizable fish is much more successful than you might think. Remember, the Japanese are the ones who developed ju-jitsu; behave appropriately. You won’t be able to horse a big guy out of a log-jam, but since the fish is fighting the whole rod, and because the extra length gives you both control and the ability to move his head around in myriad ways, you can tire a good fish in less time than it takes with a regular outfit. 7) This could be a godsend for an angler who has lost, or lost the use of, an arm or hand. (Yes, I’m getting to the age where strokes and such are possible…) Those rotten “automatic” reels never worked well anyway. I hope someone in the physical therapy world gets to know about tenkara.
Philip(Quote)
I got my start fly fishing by connecting a short piece of level fly line to a plain old bream pole. A short piece of mono sufficed for a tippet. It worked, so much so that my older brother never advanced beyond our own “tenkara” rig.
MikeL(Quote)
Philip,
Thanks for the lowdown on the rig. Were you able to get a look at the sink rate of the braided line relative to the nymph? I’m wondering how much of a “hump” there is in the fly line as it sinks. Thanks, mike
MikeL(Quote)
Mike, the line appears to be a long-ish furled leader, and I don’t think it’s fluorocarbon since it sort of floats. I grease it with Mucilin. Then I put 3 or 4 feet of tippett. Because the rod is so long, you can keep a belly from forming without too much trouble. With nymphs I just high stick it, steelhead swing, or do the Leisenring lift business. With stonefly and other weighted nymphs I put a sinker on, and high stick. That is particularly deadly, because you just flip the rig into the slot you want it to drift through, instead of attempting to cast something with physics resembling an Argentine bolo. I tried putting a bobber (sorry, strike indicator) on, but that was getting too Huck Finn for me. When the Force is working, you know when to pull up.
All the foregoing is is just the results of my limited blundering, since the rig comes with little information on the “proper” way to fish with it. Doubtless there are practitioners far more skilled than me. But that’s another part of the fun. An utter beginner, especially in a drift boat, might get a sense of how to drift a fly, and catch a few fish, without the additional distractions of reeling, casting mechanics, back cast caught in trees, etc…kind of like running a glider instead of a motorized plane.
Philip(Quote)
Anyone else remember the FFM piece (could have been a Nick Lyons) at the end of mag about witnessing a Japanese fisherman appearing through the mists? He was clad in straw, and he weilded a long, long rod. And he picked off a fish, stashed it away and disappeared back into the mist.
Flykuni(Quote)
Wielded. Now I don’t have to lop off a digit. Japanese thing.
For more on Japanese fly fishing, Tenkara rigs and traditional flies, and some wonderful photography and water colors, see Fujioka-san’s Seasons of the Mountain Village site.
Flykuni(Quote)