No rod and no money

Fishing Tenkara Fishing
1

One of the biggest frustrations in trying to help someone get started tenkara fishing - or at least started in the right direction, is when they ask a question on a forum on which I cannot respond. It happens all the time - someone on a Flintlock Forum (for example) will ask if anyone ever tried tenkara, and will invariably get an answer that is at best misleading and at worst just plain wrong.

Happened again recently. A guy wants to start tenkara fishing and not only doesn’t have a rod, doesn’t really have money to buy a rod right now. He said he had a long, heavy crappie pole or a regular fly rod, either of which he could tie a line to the rod tip and get a feel for the tenkara experience. To be diplomatic, I’ll just say I would not have given him the answer he got.

In the first place, it takes a lot less money to get a tenkara rod than most people believe. Fountainhead sells their 11’ Caddis Fly tenkara rod for just $50 http://tenkaraflyfish.webs.com/apps/webstore/ If the guy decides he really likes tenkara, he may want to upgrade later, but that’s not an unreasonable place to start. My least expensive Soyokaze is $72.

If even that is too much for right now, I would have suggested tying a furled leader to the rod tip, as John Scott did when he forgot his reel http://www.flyanglersonline.com/bb/showthread.php?45487-Tippet-length-and-line-color/page2 That is clearly not a long term solution, and has it’s risks, as John pointed out. However, the reason I would suggest the fly rod rather than the heavy 13’ crappie rod stems from my own experience. Before I could get a real tenkara rod, I was faced with a similar choice, and tried both. The heavy 13’ crappie pole, if it is anything like mine, really is heavy, and will have an action that is nowhere near that of a tenkara rod. It will not be even close to the tenkara experience that the guy is looking for.

Tying a furled leader to his fly rod tip, on the other hand, while not the same, will be closer to the feel of a tenkara rod. It will be extremely light . He’ll be able to cast it with one hand rather than two. He mentioned in his question that there were a couple streams he knew where a 9’ rod would be about ideal. I would suggest he use that set up only on those small streams, and only until he can save up $50. He would probably be wise to tape his ferrules or better yet, run a line through the guides and tie it around the grip so that he doesn’t lose his rod tip if he hooks an unexpectedly large fish or gets a snag in a treetop following a missed strike (both of which will eventually happen).

Neither the 13’ crappie pole not the line to the fly rod tip is a long term solution, but the line to the rod tip - especially on a very small, brushy stream, is closer to the tenkara experience he is trying to achieve. It should definitely give him the incentive he needs to start saving.

In general, longer is better, but also lighter is better. If he has a couple tight little streams, I’d suggest shorter and lighter for now.

2

CM Stewart,

Good advise and after reading your post and John’s, my mind got to “chewing” on this and the problem where one could possibly lose the rod tip if they tried using their fly rod with line attached to the tip section only. This is just what came up in my thinking: One could take a short piece of old fly line and attach it to their hook keeper on their fly rod and run the short piece of old fly line through the rod guides and leave about 6 inches sticking out the rod tip where one could attach their longer Tenkara style furled leader to the end of the fly line and give it a go. That way there would not be a chance of losing the rod tip section if one should hang into a larger fish. The only “problem” that comes to my mind would be if the weight of the fly line would pull the leader through the rod tip.

Just a thought and the first solution that came to mind. I love a challenge…

3

Warren

How about a piece of backing instead of the flyline??

Brad

4

Brad,

I think that would be better than fly line because it would be lighter and have less chance of pulling the Tenkara leader down through the guides. Great thinking Brad. Come to think of it, I just may have to give this a try. After all, nothing ventured, nothing gained…

I am going to the boy’s ranch this afternoon to take some of the boys fishing and after that, if still daylight, I may give this a try just so I can say I did.

5

If you don’t have any backing laying around you can use kite string. Most corner stores sell kites this time of year. Try and find the stronger dacron type.

6

no rod, no money - that’s the perfect description of my personal introduction to fixed-length line fly fishing. I had just been laid off with no idea what the next career step might be. No appreciable income, and plenty of time.

I bought a 12’ South Bend Black Beauty panfish pole at Walmart for less than $15. Since I had plenty of time, I started to experiment with various furled lines I made up. I also lashed a furled extension permanently to the end of the rod, which I terminated in a loop to accept a loop in my furled line (I think that made a big difference).

Once I got things more or less adjusted, to be honest, it cast well and caught fish (lots of them). It did start getting heavy to hold in one hand after a couple of hours, but by that time I had usually caught more than my fair share of fish, so I’d call it a day.

I guess my philosophy has always been, fishing with less than optimal equipment sure beats staying home and not fishing at all. No doubt that tenkara rods are a significant step up, but old Black Beauty was serviceable from fishing perspective.