I did fishing guide for some foreign guests from the end of May through June.
Both two parties had something to do with Mr. Ishigaki.

One group took care of him when he visited England, and the other is the American people who guided him in the States. Both insisted on meeting me when they decided to visit Japan.
They both have been doing Tenkara fishing; they didn’t bother me at all and seemed to have enjoyed fishing without

any trouble, which actually made me relieved and also made me enjoy myself with them.

They are good at stalking and wading – walking without making noise.
But there was a significant difference between Japanese fishing and fishing overseas: there are less fish in Japanese streams.

Amago, the stream queen, and iwana, rock hiding champion, are fewer in number per angler.

John Pearson searches for points thoroughly.

John made a good Tenkara casting.

Half a century ago, there were tons of fish in any stream in Japan.

I remember seeing so many fries of stream fish in the river when I dived there as a child.

50 years have passed since then and so many dams and dikes have been constructed .

What is worse, there are still a number of fishers who catch and kill.

What the fish can do for their survival is to discern the real food and fake food such as flies and lures.

Oh!! Good fish!

Therefore, Japanese stream fish are not easy to catch: they are very selective.

It is probably one of their experiences with Japanese streams to face this challenging situation.

Itoshiro in Gifu, the catch and release area which I think is the only successful area for this project

so fat in Japan, has so many fish; it also has so many anglers too.

However, challenging places sometimes make fish more willing,

which is only made possible by one of advanced Tenkara techniques.
If I have a chance again to fish with them, I would like to show such techniques to those people I guided –

Paul from England, John, Erick and Anne from the US.
They should come again to see those techniques.

Adventurous Erick. Anne just looks at him.

I have received some email messages from some people who want to come to Japan.

If you pay the guide fee and I am available for your schedule, I would love to guide you.

If you cannot make yourself understood in Japanese, we also have English speaking staff.
For more details, please send us emails.

mail:rk9k-mur@asahi-net.or.jp