This year, Tenkara Santa wants to give you some neat stocking stuffers! He’s giving away a nice little package of tenkara gear, including the following: 1. A wooden fly box hand made by Boulder Artisan and avid tenkara angler Dave Burchett. 2. A 13′ horsehair tapered line made by me. 3. A cork line spool…
When I first started fishing tenkara, I didn’t give much thought to traditional tenkara flies. The initial allure was really the tenkara rod itself and by default, I assumed that I would just use my standard patterns like the Elk Hair Caddis, Stimulator, Bead Head Hare’s Ear Nymph, and so on. And I did. And…
I’ve tried many furled tenkara lines and most of them are pretty similar: a single-material, single-color, line that tapers from butt to tip. But the new Oudachi line from Moonlit Fly Fishing is a whole different animal. The Oudachi is billed as a “nymphing” line and I’d say that’s accurate. First, rather than a consistent…
You’ve probably seen the meme “Tenkara +” going around social media. It’s the idea that tenkara compliments other outdoor hobbies such as “tenkara + hiking”, “tenkara + mushroom hunting”, “tenkara + mountain biking”, etc. While the portability of tenkara gear certainly lends itself well to being combined with other activities, it got me to thinking…
When I first started tying soft hackle flies, the conventional wisdom was that you should make the body as slender as possible. I practiced a lot to achieve perfectly smooth, anorexic bodies that were literally no more than a few silk strands thicker in diameter than the hook shank. They definitely worked great and were…
This weekend, my family and I rented a condo in Estes Park that’s right on the Fall River. It was really a family trip, not a fishing trip, but I took my tenkara gear anyway. I’ve been caught off guard too many times without a rod after stumbling on to easy fishing opportunities. So now,…
Over the centuries, countless fly patterns have been lost to history. Some have made brief resurgences in popular fly fishing culture, only to disappear and hibernate again, waiting for their next 10 seconds of fame. Still, it’s fair to say that there are probably dozens (if not hundreds) of once-popular patterns that modern fly anglers…
As a beginning fly tier, one concept was thoroughly drilled into my brain by the cronies at the local fly shop: match the hatch. The “goal” of fly tying was to imitate specific species of insects and the more realistic the fly was, the better it was. It made perfect sense. The trout are eating…
Tenkara angler and magician Dennis Vander Houwen swung by the Tenkara Talk headquarters today (OK, technically my basement but “headquarters” just sounds so much more official) and wielded a little tenkara-related magic. If you’ve ever wanted to learn how to attach your sakasa kebari to your tippet without tying a knot, watch the video!
When I was 15, I got my first fly box. I can’t recall exactly what it was, but I remember it being just a cheap plastic box from K-mart (probably a Plano). Back then, I was too preoccupied with learning how to cast and the basics of fly fishing to be concerned with what kind…
You won’t get far in your research on tenkara without coming across the Tenkara Bum website. It’s one of the best resources for learning about tenkara and one of the most popular online stores with a wide range of gear. But many might not know much about the man behind it. Chris Stewart was one of the…
When I started tenkara and first learned that many tenkara flies were tied with sewing thread, I was appalled. I mean, anything other than 8/0 Uni thread was sacrilege! And sewing thread was just plain crude. This was mostly because I was used to tying more complicated flies where sewing thread would be too thick.…
The first thing I think of when I hear “silk fly line” is bamboo. Some say that there is no smoother combination than a bamboo rod and silk line. And since the action of tenkara rods is often compared to bamboo, it would seem like silk and tenkara would go hand in hand. After my…
In my last post, I put up some pictures of my tenkara office. Shortly after, fellow tenkara angler and Holga Master Brian Schiele suggested that it would be fun to see pictures of how other tenkara anglers store their gear or where they tie their flies. I agreed, and thought it would be even more fun…