What is a Tenkara Rod

[pszy22]

I had a very nice conversation with Dr. William Hanneman yesterday. He developed the Common Cents system for measuring and comparing fly rods, and is working on an article applying the same techniques to tenkara rods. His suggestion was that we ignore the tenkara vs. not tenkara argument entirely. Call them all "telescopic rods" match them with the appropriate line and go fishing. Wise advice, I'd say.

I agree with Chris, but tend to take it a step farther. I like to refer to it as Fixed-Length Line Fly Fishing. In my mind, that is the basic concept.

Regarding the source for the original post, I may be wrong, but I somewhat doubt that the ancient masters used graphite or fiberglass rods, much less with cork grips or telescoping sections. Otherwise, it would seem like the ancient practice of tenkara didn't start until sometime in the 1950's/60's maybe even 70's/80's? Certainly sometime after I was born. Maybe that's why I feel so old.

It seem like one should at least be consistent, either stick with tradition or don't.