Misako Ishimura is the co-author of the book Tenkara – Radically Simple, Ultralight Fly-fishing , and she agreed to give us an interview, sheding a bit of light on her background and connection with tenkara.

Misako, you have greatly contributed to helping introduce tenkara to the United States. I think it was some type of sign that you were working on the “Made in Japan” exhibit for the Catskills Fly Fishing Center and Museum right at the time I was working on launching Tenkara USA. Almost exactly one month after Tenkara USA launched, the highlight of your exhibit was a demonstration on tenkara by Dr. Ishigaki who came from Japan for the event. Now, 2 years after tenkara was first introduced to the US, you worked with Dr. Kevin Kelleher on a book which will open the doors to fly fishing for many people.

TUSA: Can you tell us how you first discovered tenkara and how long you have been practicing it?

Misako: I started to research Japanese fly fishing history in year of 2000 because many anglers from the other countries at FIPS Mouche World Fly Fishing Championships have been asking me about Japanese fly fishing. During my research in Japan, I discovered tenkara. It gets my interest since tenkara is the way to catch beautiful Japanese trout.  Every time I’ve been to Japan, I collected information about tenkara little by little. Finally I had a chance to learn actual tenkara fishing from Dr. Ishigaki in the mountain stream in Gifu prefecture in June, 2008. Since then, about four years, I have been practicing it.

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Recently two of our customers, Erik and John, started organizing a tenkara gathering in Salt Lake City, Utah. I had been looking forward to returning to the area. The last time I had been there I spent a week fishing every day after work. The mountain stream fly-fishing in the area is phenomenal. That was pre-tenkara, and I had been looking forward to tenkara fishing in those mountain streams. I knew they would be tenkara-perfect. Indeed they were.

Below is a slideshow of the 4 days I spent in the area. Every day as perfect as it could be. On Thursday I arrived at the airport in late afternoon, checked into my hotel, and headed to one of my favorite streams. I called Erik up, and he was already there – mind you we had no plans to meet that afternoon, but we had a blast fishing together. Friday was a nice repeat, and it included John. Awesome company in small stream fishing. On Friday night I gave a talk at Western Rivers Fly Shop in SLC. They don’t currently carry our gear, but were very welcoming and eager to learn more about tenkara and have their customers also learn about it. The talk was followed by a great dinner at a sushi restaurant not far from the shop. Saturday we resumed the “talk” with on-stream demonstrations. We fished all day, caught some nice fish. More fishing Sunday on one of the most gin-clear streams I know. On Monday I headed up to Logan to meet with our dealers in the area. Round Rocks brought in a great crowd, many already avid tenkara anglers. The rivers were completely out of control and it was raining but I still gave the on-stream demonstration, on the stream that runs right behind their store. It was very cool to teach real tenkara to people that were so used to using it similarly to western fly-fishing.

Today I came to Bozeman and already have some great stories, which I hope to share soon, including tenkara fishing in the middle of an unexpected snow blizzard today. Tomorrow morning I’m heading on a 2-day backpacking trip with Ryan Jordan, founder of Backpackinglight.com. Definitely looking forward to this and to sharing it all with you. All in all a great time. Enjoy the pictures.

In May 2010, Daniel Galhardo, founder of Tenkara USA, spent 2 weeks in Japan learning more about tenkara, and fishing with two of the most renowned tenkara masters in the country, Dr. Hisao Ishigaki, and Sakakibara Masami (aka Tenkara no oni). Daniel captured some of their lessons on tenkara casting, and presentation/fly manipulation techniques. After about one year the video was finally edited into something at least presentable.
We hope you will pick up a couple of the tricks in the video, and most importantly learn what tenkara, the Japanese method of mountain stream fly fishing, looks like. Many more lessons were learned, but only so much can be shared in one video.
The events shown took place in the Itoshiro River area, Gifu Prefecture.

Tenkara Masters – Lessons with Dr. Ishigaki and Sakakibara Masami from Tenkara USA on Vimeo.

Daniel will be heading to Japan again in May, this time for 2 months. He will be documenting much of this trip as he visits the country and will be posting regularly. Please keep checking tenkarausa.com/blog for updates from May 10 through June 30th.

After the incredible surge in demand over the last month we quickly sold out of one of our most popular rods, the Iwana 12ft. To meet the on-going demand we brought back some of our series I Iwana from the Canadian warehouse. These were just added to our inventory and will be available until sold out, probably within the next 2 weeks.

If you had been waiting for the 12ft Iwana, now’s the time to get it. This is the first iteration of the Iwana rod, which has a shorter handle (9 inches instead of the current model 12″ handle). It’s a very nice rod, and what created the following for the Iwana. The Series II, which has a longer handle, and better quality cork, is expected back in our inventory approximately the first week of May.