Tenkara

fixed line fly fishing
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adam
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Tenkara

Post by adam »

Cane pole fishing.

My interest is sparked, back to my roots with a little fly cast thrown in...

I'm learning about it at this point, pretty excited.

It will NOT replace fly fishing, it will be a path that intermingles, a much smaller path.

I dig small streams, seems like this method lends itself to it.

I will gather no moss here.
Last edited by adam on Tue Aug 18, 2009 9:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
matsoberg
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Post by matsoberg »

I guess that´s what I did when I was a kid. Just a bamboo pole with a line tied to the tip. Not a fly line, but that stuff they used on their bait casting reels then. My dad had an old split cane spinning pole with a Record reel on it but used a float with two or three flies on the line beneath it.

I hadn´t such fancy gear, but I stole flies from the old tocacco tin box dad kept them in, spent the days on the riverbank and got back in the evening with grayling for dinner. My folks got pretty fed up with grayling after a summer...
www.scandcane.com




"Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing it is not the fish they are after". - Henry David Thoreau
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adam
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Post by adam »

Mats, that's exactly how I got started, same deal, almost to the "T" and it's interesting to hear from you about this.

Tenkara is different.

It is not so much a pole as it is a pole that will do a cast. The tip is supple and you can do overhead cast, side arm, what ever.

I've been debating the Tenkara purists about casting only the leader with my fly rod, where you pinch the line and make short casts and dapping. I say most fly anglers worth their small stream salt have Tenkara in them minus the long pole aspect *snicker*

Tenkara proper is a long rod, a 11' is considered short with a supple tip that you can send a loop off of. The line is tied directly to the tip ala our cane pole ancestry, line as long as the pole and gossamar thin, 5x thin. I'm imagining using a long leader with mine as I enjoy monofilament tapered leaders, Rio is my favorite, Frog Hair coming in a close second. I have some tiny silk line that will probably work well.

I'm going about it in a couple of ways but being a bamboozler, I'm going to find a poly construction from a couple of different bamboos. I'll probably start out with Golden for the 2/3rds butt section and a Tonkin split tip. Perhaps a 12' rod in three, four foot sections. I'm sussing out the ferrules, trying to use a organic design keeping it to silk, glue and bamboo as much as possible.

There is a graphite contingency, telescope style break-down specialized Tenkara rods. Very tip noodly. Looks like a pretty neat system actually but it's plastic and not in the very vein of the East where the discipline grew from.

Personally, my trip to Tennessee recently and fishing my family ponds has perked my interest to build a catfish cane pole but seeing Tenkara dedicated rods, there is no reason why I can't do both.

I'll populate this forum with more information (and I have collected a few good links so far) as I am able.

For me, this is not the new wave latest and greatest, it's about a step back in time and a challenge in creating a bamboo version worthy of this technique.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenkara_fishing
http://freestone.jpn.org/fml/rod/rod23.html
http://www.amago.jp.lv/b-streams/flytying/tenkara2.html
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adam
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Post by adam »

Getting excited about practicing this discipline...

I sourced three section cane poles, bought one but it is not going to work well for casting. Next Monday, I am making a visit to the Bamboo Ranch to source a couple of types of cane for split cane (conventional construction fly rods) and for Tenkara (traditional construction)

The Bamboo Ranch is awesome.

Two weeks and I go on my first outing with dedicated equipment.


...and I am zeroing in on a ultimate design in complete split bamboo construction.

It's crazy, insane but it makes total sense to me. I promised myself when I made the switch to bamboo that I would no longer be predjudiced to graphite and or bamboo. It is amazing to me, having so many wonderful adventures on stream, river, lake and sea with bamboo, that I would even consider not fishing with a reel. But my excitement stops after streams. I don't see this as anything more than fishing small streams. It is so limiting, there is freedom in the limitation but after the freedom, there is desire for more and that is where the loop sending comes to play.

Tenkara is for small streams, a nice walk and solitude.

Stoked.

Now I fully expect some colorful jokes...

c'mon, if it were you writing this, I would crack on you.
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SnooKen
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Post by SnooKen »

1) Build it hollow full length to the tip and run the line the length of the rod with an angled exit hole about 12 inches up from the butt end. Mount an old tiny skeleton flyreel to hold additional line(I'll send you one if you like). You use a long section of heavy monofilament with a loop on one end to thread the line through the rod like when loading tying thread on a bobbin. This lets you adjust line length to the situation. Maybe only a couple of feet for dapping through heavy cover or full rod length plus if needed. Also gives you some extra line for fighting a larger fish as well as backup line already threaded if a breakoff happens.

2) I'm thinking 5-7X line is for Japanese trout which average about 3-5" long. 4-6lb limp monofilament ought to work just fine for our Roundeye Trout.

3) You better work fast or the FleaFlicker will have videos posted here of his version!!! :lol:
The rods you guys are making today would cause Hiram, Edwards and the Paynes as well as Fred Devine to crap their pants then giggle like boys peeking into the girls' locker room as they strung them up and laid out the first casts.
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adam
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Post by adam »

Ha!

I hope young Flik beats me to it.

But I don't think so. I'm probably the only oddball here to do such a thing.

Ken, you really have some great ideas. I like the hollow line adjusting version. I've got a huge fishing store, "Phoenix Fishing" that has collapsable graphite poles from 10' to 20" and one has a rudimentary idea of what you say here, not internal though...

Saltwater guys are starting to use poles now for jigging.

This is not a a passing interest for me. It is by NO MEANS a replacement for fly fishing, NOTHING like that. It's nothing more than a cool way to fish a couple of my favorite streams like I know like the back of my hand and the urban ponds of home and on the farm.

The rod shoppe and my fly fishing attitude have not changed.

Who was I speaking to?

Oh, Ken, yeah, you are the best and a brave man for even entertaining some of those thoughts.

I'll post a vid soon, have some fun with it.
aguafria

Post by aguafria »

I typed a response but xed it out.
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Post by greendrake »

Adam,

No reason to crack on you.I think we all,on occassion at least,yearn to return to a time when life was simpler and less complicated and carefree.

I can't think of a better way to accomplish that than barefeet,bib overalls,a straw hat,a cane pole,a can of worms,a warm summer day and a farm pond full of cooperative bluegills.

A nice way to return to(if only for a few moments) the innocence of lost youth. :)

Will
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Post by adam »

Good move Mikey.

Minus the overalls, you nailed it for the farm ponds Will. For my little small streams in the mountains, I think it will be fun to use the long rod. This technique employs a much different skill set.

There is nothing that will replace creeping up to a spot and sending a loop thirty or so feet, a perfect loop that unfolds into a gently lit fly in the oxbow, drifting into the dark undercut, splash, tight line, dance is on. But I can see creeping up to that same oxbow, a little closer and doing the same thing with one false cast, or being able to follow that drift with a high stick. I can't figure out if it's the pure simplicity or that innocent fun of fishing with such minimal equipment.

The way I like to fish a small stream now with a fly rod is very minimal. I've cut my equipment way back on my little streams, no vest, even lucky if I carry a brook bag. Little Wheatley box, nippers, stat, tippet and small bottle of floatant along with my fly rod rigged. With the long rod, I've gotten rid of the reel and added rod length as a tool, I've always enjoyed fishing the longest rod that I could, the length being an advantage.

Seems kind of silly in a purist sense, I never had a problem going fishing when I wanted to, sometimes this is the way I want to fish because it is fun and the way that started me on a life long journey.



And I still get to enjoy making and using bamboo fly rods.
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SnooKen
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Post by SnooKen »

I read about the hollow pole approach quite awhile back somewhere on the 'Net. IIRC the article was by a guy in the Michigan area describing a local technique for catching brookies on vegetation choked small waters and he learned it as a kid from the old timers in his area.

They would start with a standard light canepole, bore out the dams from the butt end using a long steel rod with a chisel point ground onto it. At the tip end dams they'd use a small diameter hot steel needle. Back down at the butt end, about where the stripper guide would usually be located, a bevelled angled hole was drilled into the culm wall for the line to be fed into the rod shaft.

They used these rods to dap worms, rigged with splitshot, into tight pockets. The line could be drawn up tight to the tip then the rod tip fed through a small opening in the foliage and the line fed back out to place the bait precisely where it needed to go.

I don't believe these rods were jointed. The line through the blank approach has continued to be toyed with by commercial manufacturers over the years. Not sure if any aspect of this would be applicable to what you're interested in doing but what the Hell, always neat to see variations on cat skinning. :wink:
The rods you guys are making today would cause Hiram, Edwards and the Paynes as well as Fred Devine to crap their pants then giggle like boys peeking into the girls' locker room as they strung them up and laid out the first casts.
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