If you watch the TUSA video of Amano Katsutoshi tenkara fly tying. During the video a little pop-up text says that he uses silk line that he treats with persimmon to make it stiffer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... FY-lx0yVtk

I found this Japanese web site where it shows eyeless hook kebari

http://jofu10kara.cocolog-nifty.com/blo ... -d76b.html

It also shows that he uses " bead cord periseide " natural silk.



- if I google that term I get web sites mostly in the UK or Germany. However, if I just google ' bead cord ' I get results for here in the USA.



Esslinger is in St Paul, Mn. But a good chance you can find the same Griffin silk bead cord at your local craft store, or Amazon. Esslinger was just where I found it quickly.

There are bead threads and bead cords. The Esslinger site explains that bead cord is braided. $2.19/ card but I didn't see how many feet of cord is on the card.

http://www.esslinger.com/griffin-silk-bead-cord.aspx

Esslinger has the bead cord in 12 different gauges. I can't make out the gauge size on the picture above. If you watch the Amano video when he holds up the card with the silk line on it I can see the # 2 printed on the bottom of the card. Perhaps that is gauge 2 cord. Esslinger list guage 2 as .45mm. Or maybe not, maybe Japan uses a different sizing system.

Amano appears to use red or vermilion color
The guy at the web site above prefers white 白いシルクコード but mentions red 朱シルクコード which, he seems to not like for some reason. The translation was too jumbled to make sense of it.

If you want a challange, you can run this web site through google translate and see if you can make sense of it. He runs a Test of the 2 colors of loop, Red vs White.
Basically he wound kebari ( shows up a bali hair in google) using red and white silk cord for the loop ( shows up a lillian pike in translate). Probably the best you will get out of it is that below the picture with the white loop, it says proven bali hair. But below the picture with the red loop kebari it says something about being 'a big fool for using vermilion'. However, red/vermilion apparently works for Amano.

http://jofu10kara.cocolog-nifty.com/blo ... -10d7.html

For something much more fun do a google search with this term or the terms separately :

穂先のリリアン・シルクコード・毛鉤 ( Hosaki no Ririan shirukukōdo kebari )

穂先 , hosaki, will often translate as pike, but sometimes as ' ear tip'- thus, rather descriptive of what the loop looks like.
Literally ' ear tip lillian - silk cord - fly '

I get about 5 pages in google images of many eyeless hook kebari being tied. Mostly the same guys web site. At least that's what I get. Some still images shows detail of how the loop is tied onto the hook.

- ymmv - one thing I have learned lately, and not happy about it really, is that google keeps track of your previous search history and it will give you results dependent on that search history. The result is that different people doing a google search using the same term will get different results. So search with that term, open a few web sites of interest, then repeat the search. You may get more related results the 2nd or 3d time searching. Or better yet, do a google search for one of the 3 terms
穂先のリリアン・シルクコード・毛鉤 , then repeat the search using all three or just 2 of the terms. The different search results is rather amazing.
Works with English words too.

How the 'ear loop' is tied on

http://jofu10kara.cocolog-nifty.com/blo ... index.html

Oh along the way I found these interesting terms for the other lillian . The lillian at the tip of the pole.


穂先のリリアン竿 , Hosaki no Ririan sao , ear loop lillian pole
穂先のリリアン竿の修理 , Hosaki no Ririan sao no shūri , ear loop lillian repair

turns up some interesting images.

fwiw,

D

One thing I have noticed is that white was one of my two best kebari colors last year. I have tried red kebari in the past and couldn't buy a bite on them, yet I used to fish a red body dry fly and did amazingly well I still can't figure that one out.
A side note, I really like the looks of the silver pheasant feathers. I am picking up a few odd n ends from a place that has skins. I may just have to get one.
Dale

Just got back from the store ..... They had ... bead chord, just not the right size. ......Dale

J.....is it just me or do the Tenkara anglers in Japan seem to fish flies that are bigger than what we would typical fish in the states?
Dale

...I just watched the Amano video again. I find it interesting that he finishes off the fly at the back of the hook and not behind the hackle.
Dale

Loops on Yoshikazu Fujioka blind eye flies:
...They were beautiful. Fujiokasan's flies that were tied on blind eye hooks had synthetic loops, probably made from tippet material around 2x thickness. I couldn't tell whether the material was mono (nylon), copolymer, or fluorocarbon. The loops were fairly large in size, perhaps one to two times the length of the fly body.
-Jack

Was there any particular color of the eye loops on the Fujioka flies you saw? Clear, pink, green, or some other color?