This video was too funny not to share. The Tenkara Guides, based in Salt Lake City, UT, outdid themselves in this fly-tying video. I can see it going viral in short order. The commentary is quite hillarious, though I wish we could see their faces and figure out how they were not cracking up when narrating this good fly-tying video. It’s R-rated only if you’re an adult with a dirty mind, but you can have kids in the room, no problem.

For more fly-tying videos by the Tenkara Guides visit their site, or their Youtube page.

If you’re like most fly anglers, you like flies. Small and large, dull and shiny, reversed or “normal”. As we have introduced tenkara outside of Japan, we have focused on telling the story of tenkara, on sharing the fascinating layers of a method that has been practiced in Japan for centuries. I have gone to Japan numerous times and have spent a lot of time with multiple tenkara masters to learn the method as a whole. I did that to learn things that I couldn’t have learned otherwise, and to share the story with anyone who is interested.

Through tenkara, we have learned that we can make nets out of one branch of a tree. We have learned about flies made from snake skin, and flies made with dubbing from a plant. And, we have learned that most Japanese tenkara anglers of nowadays, perhaps largely influenced by their commercial angler predecessors, use only one fly pattern and focus on learning and refining technique rather than second-guessing fly choice. We also learned that a tenkara rod is just a tool, and in the end ANY fly will work. These are things I have shared on this blog for no purpose other than tell the true story of a method of fishing that I find fascinating, and perhaps to inspire folks to realize how simple fly-fishing can be. It’s never to tell people to simplify their fishing, simply to say it is possible to simplify it.

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This weekend Tenkara USA is attending the Winston-Salem Fly Fishing Show in North Carolina. Yesterday I had the pleasure of meeting Loften Deprez, someone who has been contributing to the forum and whose name I was slightly familiar with. What I did not know was that he is only 15 years old and a tenkara fly-tying talent to watch.

As it turned out, Loften had secured himself a spot as a fly tyer at the Fly Fishing Show and was demonstrating to folks how to tie tenkara flies. I came by to watch him and shot a short video of him tying a fly that had caught my eye. As he finished his fly someone asked him why he made the eyes of the flies like that. I watched with great pride as Loften started giving the person the long version of the answer. He described in great detail not just the question at hand, but what tenkara is. He pulled a rod and began, “well, let me tell you about tenkara…” Later that day the gentleman was seeing walking out of the show with a tenkara rod in hand. Loften did a great job at introducing a lot of people to tenkara, and for that we thank him. You may checkout Loften Deprez’s company at www.latackleflies.com

The Tenkara Guides of Utah put together this really cool fly-tying video below. I love their use of multiple cameras and embedded picture-in-picture editing. Check it out:

Today is my last day in Japan. Margaret and I returned to Tokyo yesterday to spend time with some friends before we leave to China tomorrow morning. I decided to stop by the Sansui store again and say hi to Mr. Sasaki before we left. As we entered the store it looked like he was tying tenkara flies on the counter. It turned out he was putting together some rigs for ayu fishing. The conversation obviously turned to tenkara flies, and with me asking if he would tie a tenkara fly for the camera. He was a bit shy about it at first, saying he considers himself a “beginner” fly-tyer, but he eventually agreed. I captured this film in one go as he was still working and customers were coming through the door as we worked on the video. It was also edited as quickly as I could as it was a full day and we depart to the aiport in about 5 hours.

One of the most interesting parts of the way he ties his tenkara flies is the way he finishes them. He uses what he calls a “tokkuri” knot, which I was not familiar with. Also, the video is a reminder that not all tenkara flies are in the “sakasa” style. Tenkara flies come in a variety of patterns, the sakasa (or reverse-hackle) being the most characteristic ones but certainly not the only ones.

I hope you will enjoy this video.

In 2011 I taught a kid in Maze, a village in Gifu, Japan, how to tie tenkara flies. Kyosuke was his name. He really enjoyed the craft and pretty soon started teaching it to his friend Taichi. They took to it pretty quickly and were soon tying tenkara flies just for the fun of it.
Earlier this year, my host Ikumi and Rocky sent me pictures of the kids of Maze tying tenkara flies at the Mazegawa Fishing Center (Mizube No Yakata). They seemed to be having a ball. I was super proud when I got those pictures.
They continue tying tenkara flies and spreading tenkara fishing to their friends. Most kids in the area had no idea what tenkara was when I visited in 2011, now it may be turning into part of their regular conversations. Tenkara introduced to Japan…from the US. Here’s a fun video I put together of some of their tenkara fly-tying experience:

Tenkara Flies on Wednesdays is back? On a Tuesday??? I’ll be less US-centric time-wise for this post. By the time the post is up on our site, it will be Wednesday here in Japan, so I’ll run with it.

One of the things I had promised you to do on this trip was to cover some fly-tying with our friends in Japan. Yesterday was our last day in the Maze area, and while there wasn’t as much time as I had hoped to cover tenkara fly-tying, I made a point to ask my friend Shintaro Kumazaki to demonstrate his go-to tenkara fly. Shintaro grew up fishing. His father did tenkara before him, and his parents have owned the tackle shop in town for the last 12 years. Also, he’s practically next-door neighbor with the famed Katsutoshi Amano (by the way, this post and video of Mr. Amano are a must-see if you are interested in tenkara and tenkara flies). Shintaro has taken a much stronger interest in tenkara when I was visiting last year. He certainly caught the tenkara bug when we embarked on an epic trip fishing and canyoneering in search of wild iwana.

On another note, Shintaro and I had a very enjoyable afternoon session of tenkara fly-tying last year when i was visiting. The small picture to the right, which says “SHARE”, is of Shintaro tying a tenkara fly for me last year >;>;>;>;>;>;>;>;>;>;>;>;

After we were done with sawanobori (shower-climbing) and fishing yesterday, we headed over to his parent’s tackle shop (/pottery store) in Hagiwara, where he had his fly-tying station ready to go. I hope the film I shot (hand-held, and edited in my last 3-hour train ride) will please you.

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There is no way around it, it is very difficult to post about things as they happen when things are happening fast and the days are packed. It’s about 11:30PM right now and I finally was able to sit down. Among emails to respond to, the wish to review all the pictures and videos I have been capturing and the utmost desire to crash for the night, I’m left with three choices: writing quickly about several things that are happening (and hope to elaborate on them a bit more in a few days); try to write a more developed post about one topic (difficult to do when I’m tired); or not write at all. So, here goes a quick recap of the last couple of days.

Yesterday we got to spend a fair amount of time witnessing two unusual methods of catching the local Ayu. One is called takuri, which is diving for ayu and capturing them with grapple hooks. The other was done at night time, where the locals showed us an old method of catching large quantities of ayu in which they place large torches in different points of a large river pool; a net is stretched out in the middle of the river, and then the local fishermen will wave the torches, throw rocks in the water, etc, to scare the ayu toward the net. The method is no longer common practice, but done as a special event to maintain the tradition. Yesterday tour agents from throughout Japan showed up at the fishing center to observe it and hopefully add the attraction to their tours. They arrived in the middle of a huge downpour – though luckily the torches remained lit. Net fishing is certainly not a sport fishing activity, and not our cup of tea. Takuri fishing was VERY much a sport, and very unusual. Both were a fascinating demonstration of the inventiveness of humans when it comes to the activity of catching fish.

With the rains we have been experiencing here Margaret and I also spent sometime indoors yesterday. Luckily our “indoors” was the vast resource of the Mazegawa Fishing Center (Mizube no Yakata). As Margaret worked on emails, I browsed some books describing the variety of fishing methods in this country. Brain candy for sure! The illustration below is of a method called “tomozuri” for catching ayu, in which a live fish serves as a decoy to attract the wrath of another ayu, whose territoriality will prove to be its fate. The attacking fish is then hooked in the trailing hook and it will then become food.

Today we took a bit of a more adventurous path in our journey. I took Margaret on a “shower-climbing” and fishing trip. We rappelled down a 30ft waterfall to an otherwise inaccessible place. I had been to the top of these waterfalls numerous times when  I was here last year but never down to the good-looking and hope-inspiring spot below. Today I got to fish it, though lack of access did not mean superb fishing. We swam around the river as well to find fish below the surface, but the water was a bit murky from the rain in the last couple of days.

This is a beautiful, although small amago from Mazegawa.

After our shower-climbing expedition we hit one more spot in hopes of being rewarded with plenty of amago or iwana. None took our flies, not a bite! But, I did capture some good video of my friend Shintaro Kumazaki and really enjoyed the company and watching his technique. I’ll try to post the videos I took of him pretty soon.

After fishing I asked Shintaro if he’d be willing to tie one of his tenkara flies for the camera, and he agreed. Shintaro’s parents own a tackle shop in Hagiwara. He has been tying tenkara flies for sometime now and actually sells them for ¥350 (about $4.5 per fly). We headed over to their store and Shintaro showed us how he ties his main fly. Video to come soon.

Of course, the day would not be complete without …a visit to the onsen (hot springs). No photos of that, but man, was that ever good after such a packed day!

Yesterday we shared with you the news of a new release in the world of tenkara, “Tying Tenkara Flies” a DVD produced by LearnTenkara.com (available for sale at learntenkara.com and soon here at Tenkara USA). This is by far the best fly-tying DVD ever produced, and we’re lucky it is about tenkara flies. Brian Flemming, the producer and cinematographer, shared one of the entire videos with us for today’s Tenkara Flies on Wednesdays.

In today’s video I share a basic tenkara fly pattern, my variation of Mr. Amano’s tenkara fly. I use peacock herl as the collar and whatever feather and line they had on hand when I tied the video – I believe it was partridge for the feather and silk line. Coincidentally, as we’re just about to board a plane for the second Tenkara Summit, this video was shot on my last day in Montana after last year’s Tenkara Summit. I came over to Brian’s house to make this video just hours before departing Montana. It was probably midnight when we started shooting and even with the shot of whiskey and being super tired, I am glad to see my speech wasn’t too slurred.

Enjoy it.

Written by Daniel

The first DVD about tenkara fly-tying ever made is now being released by LearnTenkara.com. Not only is this the first DVD focused on tenkara flies, but as far as I know it is the highest-quality fly-tying DVD ever put together. The quality is highly professional throughout every minute of this 2.5 hour DVD (17 fly patterns). Some serious content in there and well worth the price ($24.98). Seriously, I have never seen a DVD like this about fly-tying, the commentary is great, the content new and refreshing and the video quality superb. You can watch the preview below for an idea of how good it is.

The DVD is already available for pre-sale directly from LearnTenkara.com , it will  be available for sale at the Tenkara Summit and will also be available for sale here at Tenkara USA starting approximately July 30th.

Written by Jason

Daniel has been posting a lot of flies from tenkara anglers in Japan over on the Tenkara USA Facebook page lately (click here to see Daniel’s summary from his blog post yesterday).  They’re all beautiful and unique but one in particular struck me as distinctly different.  It was the Kurobe kebari tied by Mr. Fujioka.  At first glance, this fly might not seem like anything special.  But what I found so interesting about it was the fact that the hackle was palmered.  “Palmered” means that the hackle is wound through the body of the fly, rather than just at the head as in many tenkara flies.  It reminded me of some of the classic British palmered flies such as the Wickham’s Fancy or Soldier Palmer.  While I knew that not all tenkara flies are tied in the reverse hackle sakasa kebari style, it was the first time I had seen a tenkara fly with palmered hackle.  And it got me thinking…

Even though I’ve mostly given up my entomological pursuits, I couldn’t help but be reminded of a simple fact.  Real insects don’t have legs that point out from their head like a sakasa kebari.  They have legs splayed out through their thorax. Some point forward, some point back.  And when they’re tumbling or swimming, they could point in any given direction in what must resemble more of a jumbled mess than a neat “paint brush”.  It would seem then that a palmered fly would more closely replicate an insect than a pattern with hackle just behind the eye.

And the more I thought of it, I discovered a couple of other reasons why palmered flies would seem to make sense.

For one, they offer the illusion of more movement.  If one of the keys to the sakasa kebari’s effectiveness is the motion in its hackle, then wouldn’t it look like more things were moving if the hackle were spread out rather than concentrated all in one place?

Another is segmentation.  Palmering the hackle through the body leaves gaps between the wraps that create a segmented look (another buggy hallmark). And, it does this without the need to add any extra ribbing material like copper wire.

So after all of this, I decided to try to tie some Palmered style flies.  As soon as I got going, I realized how open to experimentation this style is.  There are literally an infinite number of material and color combinations you could use for the body, thorax, and abdomen.  I actually had a hard time settling on which ones to chose for my first go.  Obviously, this will be an ongoing experiment but here are a few to get started…

Recipe:  Olive & Yellow

Hook:  Any eyeless hook
Thread:  Olive 8/0
Eye:  #2 silk bead cord, brown
Abdomen:  Yellow turkey biot
Thorax:  Olive dubbing
Hackle:  Olive grizzly saddle

Recipe:  Grey

Hook:  Any eyeless hook
Thread:  Grey 8/0
Eye:  #2 silk bead cord, red
Abdomen:  Grey turkey biot
Thorax:  Grey dubbing
Hackle:  Natural grizzly saddle

Recipe:  Peacock & Gold

Hook:  Any eyeless hook
Thread:  Black 8/0
Eye:  #2 silk bead cord, black
Abdomen:  Gold wire, med.
Thorax:  Peacock sword
Hackle:  Black saddle

Recipe:  Brown & Orange Pheasant

Hook:  Any eyeless hook
Thread:  Orange 8/0
Eye:  #2 silk bead cord, white
Abdomen:  Pheasant tail
Thorax:  Burnt orange dubbing
Hackle:  Pheasant hackle

Seeing these flies from Japan has really got me thinking beyond sakasa kebari.   Back when I thought the only tenkara flies were sakasa kebari, it felt kind of limiting. But now, I have a new sense of freedom and a whole world of tenkara fly tying opportunities ahead of me.

What styles of tenkara flies have you tied that are “outside the box”?

For a couple of weeks we have been posting numerous interesting tenkara fly patterns on our Facebook page - daily. Many of these were tied by Mr. Yoshikazu Fujioka, my teacher on the aspect of tenkara flies, and several others were tied by tenkara anglers I have met and exchanged flies with in Japan.

Tenkara fly collection

There are some amazing gems amidst the collection. Though the sakasa kebari (or, reverse-hackle fly) are the most prominent and characteristic type of tenkara fly, not all of them are tied in that fashion. Here’s a chart that Mr. Fujioka put together about the most common styles of tenkara flies. See where the flies below will fit within the chart.

Several flies we are featuring are interpretations of historical flies by Mr. Fujioka, some are modern creations and a few may have been passed down from father to son.  If you get a chance, join our Facebook page for the daily inspiration provided by these tenkara flies. Or, check in here in a couple of weeks for more flies.

Here are some highlights of the flies we have posted so far:

Morioka Kebari. Tenkara fly tied by Mr. Fujioka using rooster, silk and peacock herl