From a potential newbie

[Ray Kunz]

How do you tie a hackle to make it face forward? Where do you tie it off?

First: Here in most of New England our small freestone woodland streams are lined with woodland and not open plains. I would think that avoiding backcasts would be great but an 11 foot rod might buy the problem right back. I'm looking for advice.

Secondly: why are all the little videos of Tenaka fishing always showing micro-size fish?
I've not seen one over ten or eleven inches.

Also: is Tenkara fishing useable for streamers, Muddlers and Wooly Buggers that I'm used to?

[CM_Stewart]

I answered the hackle question in your other thread (I saw that one before this one).

I fish small woodland streams, too. Trees and brush right up to the banks, overhanging tree limbs in spots. I tend to wade up the left bank (left if facing upstream) and cast with my back cast down the center of the stream. The rod is longer but the amount of line beyond the rod tip may be shorter than you use now. You may not get hung up any more than you do now.

small-stream-5.jpg

This is the stream I probably fish the most. My best ever day on it was with a 14.5' rod.

You probably haven't seen this video, then: http://learntenkara.com/videos/playi...-with-tenkara/
And the only reason there wasn't a video of this fish is the camera battery died just before I hooked it:

RMNP-brown.jpg

Realistically, most of the videos shot of tenkara are taken on small streams, and most small stream trout are under 10". There are a few photos of significantly larger trout (as well as lots more photos of much smaller trout) on TenkaraBum.com. See the Ayu Rod Review page for a nice bull trout, or the Hand Tied Lines page for a 24" rainbow.

I have caught a few fish on bucktails and muddlers, but obviously you have to just twitch the fly or pull it with the rod tip, you can't strip in line. Because the lines used are so light, large, wind resistant or heavily weighted flies do not cast well.

[JohnScott]

... taken on a Tenkara rod.



This guy went 17" and I caught him in some pretty fast current. He ate a large weighted rubber legs stonefly nymph, which is certainly as heavy as any of the streamers you mentioned, fished off a 13' TenkaraUSA Ayu.

I don't fish streamers with Tenkara rods, but I think you would do very well if dead drifting them. Swinging them might be another matter, especially if you were to hook up with a large fish - pop goes the tip.

John

[pszy22]

Ray,

While there is no right/wrong-good/bad with any style of fly fishing; if you do decided to give a fixed-length line system a go, I encourage you to give some dry/damp flies a try. You may be surprised at the positive results you have fishwise. Above and beyond fish catching, part of the appeal of tenkara for me personally is how pleasurable it is to cast. I've yet been able to put it in words. but to me it's a different feel than when fishing with a reeled rod. While I enjoy my time spent with either method, I just find the casting mechanics of a fixed-length line system to be especially enjoyable.

[Byron haugh]

Ray,
What would be the difference using a 10' fly rod and limiting your cast to the rod and high sticking?
Thanks

[CM_Stewart]

Byron,

The biggest difference is that the tenkara line is so much lighter than any fly line. You can keep a lot more of it off the water's surface, so don't have to fish almost under your rod tip. You can fish on the other side of a current seam and never have to mend, because the line isn't on the water.

Another difference is that the 10' rod is really on the short side for tenkara. Casting distance is significantly less than rod length plus line length plus tippet length, because the rod tip is kept high. The longer the rod, the longer the line it can handle easily, so the further away you can fish and the fewer fish get spooked.

It is hard for people to imagine how light the line is until they try it. Most tenkara rods can easily cast an unweighted wet fly with nothing more than say 13' of 0X fluorocarbon tied to the rod tip, followed by 3-4' of 5X tippet - and still protect the 5X well enough to land 20" trout.