Let's Go Fly Fishing!

I was born and raised in Musashi-Koganei, and I remember often going fishing with my uncle in the Tama River. At Keio University, I joined a fishing club called the Chugyokai.

I heard that the Chugyokai at that time had four sections based on the type of fishing.

I joined the mountain stream section. I went fishing in places like Yamagata, Niigata, and Aomori, but I especially loved Hokkaido, which is why I got a job at the Hokkaido Takushoku Bank (laughs). There was a period when I was away from fishing, but about 30 years ago, I started bait fishing for cherry salmon (called yamabe in Hokkaido and Tohoku) with some fishing buddies.

So you started with bait fishing.

Yes. But conversely, bait fishing was too easy and became boring. Then one day, I saw a cherry salmon rising (a predatory behavior where the fish moves at the water's surface) in response to aquatic insects, and I thought it would be interesting to catch them with a fly. So I went out with my friends to buy a rod and flies (artificial bait), and that was my entry into this world. I've been fly fishing for about 30 years now.

I graduated from Osaka Medical College, but when I finished graduate school, a professor in the same field in the UK invited me to come study there for a year or two. That boss loved fly fishing.

At the time, I was focused entirely on my studies and ended up returning to Japan without ever being taught fly fishing. However, I continued to visit that professor frequently, and eventually, I started fishing every time I went to the UK.

Back then, brands like Hardy were dominant, and I even received some old British fishing tackle from him.

Hardy makes wonderful reels. My encounter with fishing was through my family. When I was in junior high, it was a rule that every Saturday I would go fishing with my father from morning until night, and we would spend that time talking.

One time, my father invited me to see a movie. It was "A River Runs Through It" (1992), famous as the film directed by Robert Redford and starring Brad Pitt in his first major role. It depicts family bonds through fly fishing.

When I first saw it, to be honest, I didn't quite understand the story, but I saw stoneflies hatching in the sunset and flying into the sky over a majestic American river. In that setting, there was a scene of a father and son casting their rods in a four-beat rhythm, and I was deeply captivated by it.

It wasn't just the act of fishing; it was something about family relationships or life itself that resonated within me. That was the catalyst for me starting fly fishing.

There are various theories, but fly fishing is said to have been started by British aristocrats over 500 years ago. The equipment and methods are quite different from ordinary Japanese fishing.

In Japanese mountain streams, there is a type of fishing that uses artificial flies (kebari), but the big difference is that the Japanese version doesn't use a reel. In fly fishing, you use a thick colored line and a thin transparent line called a leader. You transfer the repulsive force generated by the rod to the line to cast a weightless fly a long distance without any sinkers to catch fish.

One of the charms of fly fishing, paradoxically, is "not catching anything." It often happens that a friend doing bait fishing catches three fish while I catch none.

But that's exactly why you think, "Why am I not catching anything?" Is the fly wrong? Is the system (rig) wrong? Is the spot I'm drifting it through wrong? Am I not catching anything because they aren't rising? Then you change the fly, change the drift... in short, there is so much room for ingenuity.

Because of that, the joy when you do catch one is several times greater than in bait fishing. I believe that is the essence of fly fishing.

Depending on where various fish are at any given time, the points and depths you target in the river change. This is incredibly interesting.

Therefore, there are countless combinations of rods, lines, and flies depending on the current you are targeting. How to use these systems to drift the fly, and how to target the exact moment a fish jumps to the surface for a winged insect.

There are floating flies called dry flies that mimic insects on the water's surface. In this case, reading the casting point is extremely important. Fish are always in places where a lot of food drifts by without them having to use much energy.

Since you often can't see the fish themselves, you read the surface current of the river to understand where the fish are positioned. That's the fun part.

Actually, my specialty in medical sciences is secretion and absorption. Gastric acid secretion involves liquid flowing across body membranes. The inside of a cell is structured as if there are stones with water flowing between them. I feel a similar sensation in the flow of a river.

So there are things in common.

If there's even a slight sense of unnaturalness, the fish will never come. You have to devise ways to make the insect drift naturally. This is the difficult part.

I think the appeal of fly fishing can be broadly divided into four types of enjoyment.

One is casting. This is the key point of fly fishing—how to use the heavy line to throw the fly exactly where you want. Next is the fight. Fly fishing uses reels that haven't changed much in shape or principle for a long time, so the fight when a fish is hooked is very exciting. The third is tying—making your own flies using bird feathers or animal fur.

Finally, and I think this is the philosophy of fly fishing, is nature observation. As both of you mentioned, you choose your fly based on the water flow, the movement of aquatic insects, and the characteristics of the fishing spot. There is that kind of enjoyment as well.

That's exactly right. Regarding tying, the materials for flies include peacock feathers and animal fur, which you wrap. However, as I get older, I lose my patience, and I just end up with a surplus of materials (laughs).

I'm not very good at it, so no matter what I tie, it just looks like a ball of fuzz (laughs).

However, the catch rate varies depending on how precisely the fly is made. Some professional anglers camp out, examine the stomachs of the fish they catch to see what insects they currently prefer, tie flies that night, and use them the next day.

Flies can be broadly classified into four types.

The first is the Dry Fly that Dr. Soma mentioned, which has buoyancy. They are designed to float on the water's surface and are characterized by representing the shapes of adult aquatic or terrestrial insects.

The second is the Wet Fly. Wet flies are designed to sink below the surface and mimic larvae, nymphs, pupae, or drowned insects.

Then there are Nymphs, which are designed to resemble the immature forms of aquatic insects or small crustaceans.

The last one is the Streamer. These are flies that mimic small fish that predatory fish feed on, and they are relatively large.

Streamers are used in relatively large rivers when targeting large migratory fish. In Hokkaido, there is a large river called the Tokachi River where white-spotted char come up from the sea. We target them with streamers using long double-handed rods.

Depending on the river conditions or the season, we use various flies. There's also the timing of when insects hatch.

Also, flies have what are called "patterns"—combinations of shapes, materials, and colors that have been tested over hundreds of years and proven to catch fish. There are millions of patterns. One of the most famous is the Royal Coachman.

That's a famous pattern. It works for anything. Also, the Elk Hair Caddis is a famous pattern. For something unusual, there's the Chernobyl Ant.

That's a fly mimicking a large ant, given a cynical name after giant ants were supposedly found in Chernobyl. New flies come out every year in magazines and online, so it's hard to keep up.

In terms of fly fields (fishing spots), Hokkaido is truly a utopia.

Even so, it's become much harder to catch fish there. Targeting migratory fish with streamers is best in Hokkaido's large rivers.

Fishing in lakes has a different kind of fun compared to rivers. When I went to Lake Shikotsu to fish for rainbow trout, I placed a cicada fly on the lake surface. Unlike a river, there is no current, so it just floats there. A large rainbow trout about 60 cm long came at it, but it didn't bite well that time. On my third trip, I finally caught one about 50 cm long that lunged at the fly, and I was thrilled.

Also, the ability to row your own boat and move to your preferred spot is appealing. The best spots are where a river flows into the lake; you let a dry fly float there. Then a fish strikes. This excitement is addictive.

It has a different appeal than rivers. I've been to Hokkaido several times as well.

I went to Lake Daisetsu at the headwaters of the Ishikari River. In a wand (a deep, bay-like area) of the lake, a large rainbow trout was swimming, and real cicadas were falling from above, so I thought it was a chance and started immediately. Then, it bit my fly instead of a real cicada.

You'd think fish are smart enough to distinguish the real thing, but that time it wasn't the case and it ate my fly. That was memorable.

Even fish aren't perfect (laughs).

The fact that rivers have a current and lakes don't is a very interesting point from the perspective of an essayist.

We fly fishers always have that excitement the night before a trip, like the night before a school field trip when we were kids. However, as everyone has said, fly fishing is a type of fishing where you don't catch much. Days where you can truly say "today was a great day" only happen a few times a year.

Because there is so much time spent not catching anything, you think about many things. As various great writers have noted, the flow of a river has something that deeply attracts the angler's heart. Within that flow, anglers let their thoughts wander. The wind flows, the water flows, and various thoughts—joy, sadness, the hardships of life—overlap with the flow, and the river is there.

Conversely, in a lake, the water is still. Especially in the morning when the wind is calm, it's like a mirror. I get the feeling that my own life is inevitably reflected there.

That's certainly true. When there's truly no wind, you float a cicada fly on the lake and wait, wondering when it will come. There's a thrill and the fun of thinking about various things. You try not to stand out, sitting on a log or something, just watching.

Sometimes you catch a series of decent fish over 30 cm, but if that continues for a while, it stops being interesting. It's a luxury, but if I'm going to catch something, I want a big one. But the big ones are cautious. So you quietly think about how to make them bite. That tension and the joy when you do catch one is what's great.

In the UK, someone who looks like the local landowner will come to the river, and without even casting, will suddenly sit on a bench and start reading a book. Then, when a fish jumps on the surface, they'll suddenly close the book, stand up, cast, catch a fish in one shot, and go home. It's a truly aristocratic fishing lifestyle (laughs).

The interesting part is that it's not just about whether you catch something.

I think fly fishing is a type of fishing you can't do unless you have a certain amount of free time. That might be a bit difficult for people trying to start something new.

However, I think it has become popular in Japan over the last 20 years or so. When I think about why people started doing it in Japan, I think in the past, people fished in mountain streams and lakes with a hunting mindset.

In short, it was for the purpose of taking them home to eat. But nowadays, even if you catch a lot, you can't eat them all. Besides, modern Japan has plenty of other food.

Rather, fly fishing has become popular as an outdoor sport. That's why I think people can enjoy it even if they don't catch anything.

If you look into it, the number of people doing fly fishing is actually decreasing. However, the market is growing. While there are no objective materials to track the fly fishing population, if you look at the market trends by fishing type from the Japan Fishing Tackle Manufacturers Association and the overall fishing population in the "Leisure White Paper," the population is decreasing in the long-term trend, but sales of fly fishing equipment have grown over the last five years. Consumption per person is on the rise.

Does that mean more people are getting particular about their gear?

Since many fly fishers are older, people with time and money to spare are spending more on gear, which I think is driving sales.

On the other hand, in recent years, there has been a significant increase in clothing inspired by fly fishing in the fashion industry. Barbour's short blousons were originally made for fly fishing, but they are very popular with the younger generation, and as 90s fashion—when fishing was popular—becomes a trend again, high-end brands are incorporating fishing elements into their designs. I think some young people are starting fly fishing because they are attracted to this fashion.

Speaking of fashion, the American brand Simms is currently dominant in many ways. Now, in places like Sapporo, almost no one wears big overcoats anymore; both women and men are wearing jackets made of light, durable materials like those made by Simms. It seems young people sometimes adapt things made for fishing and enjoy them as fashion.

There's also the fact that it's difficult to cast to a targeted point without a certain amount of practice.

Some people just love casting. There are Chugyokai alumni who practice casting at the Tama River, and that is also a form of enjoyment. In short, there are people who are like driving range pros in golf. There are clubs or gatherings like that at the Tama River.

So the act of throwing is fun.

Like competing to see who can throw the furthest. I'm sure they don't completely avoid catching fish, but there is that kind of enjoyment in casting as well.

I am not very good at tying flies, and I have never particularly studied casting.

If I were to say I studied something, it would be line mending—a casting technique to avoid having the line caught and pulled by the river current. If the fly is pulled by the line and skims across the water surface, the fish won't bite anymore. To make it flow as naturally as possible, you snap the rod back immediately after casting to drop the fly upstream and buy some time, but this is difficult.

Casting methods differ depending on the location. The basic casting style is overhead, but since you swing the rod by extending the line back and forth, it gets snagged if there are trees behind you.

That is why about 20 years ago, a method called Spey casting—where you place the line on the water surface to load the rod—was born and became a huge hit. This style originated on the River Spey in Scotland.

However, fishing for Ito (Sakhalin taimen) in places like the Sarufutsu River in Hokkaido is done overhead, focusing on how far you can cast to expand your range. It is quite difficult to decide what kind of line and system to use depending on the location and the fish. Even if you understand the theory, choosing and combining the right gear varies by the actual location and time of day. That is also part of the fun of fly fishing.

Unlike in Japan, overseas it is common to have a guide. These are people who make a living by looking after anglers.

In Japan, cases of anglers being attacked by brown bears have been increasing since around last year. Last year, a veteran fly fisher who visited Lake Shumarinai in Hokkaido alone was unfortunately attacked and killed by a bear.

Does that mean we are heading in a direction where it is better to always have a guide in Japan as well?

Yes. Since actual damage is occurring, opinions are emerging that it is time to reconsider fishing guides from a safety perspective.

Anglers get so focused on fishing that there is a high risk they won't notice a bear appearing. That is exactly why it is necessary for guides to teach fishing while ensuring safety and receive a certain amount of compensation. There are guides in Japan now, but since individuals have various ways of doing things, there are some difficult aspects.

I have also gone fishing in Hokkaido a few times with a guide. They really know everything. It is standard to have a guide overseas, isn't it?

In places like New Zealand, there are spots without guides, but in reality, you don't catch much. As expected, the catch is completely different when a guide is involved. Even on the same river, there are naturally places where you can catch fish and places where you can't, and there are many spots that only local guides know.

This is a story from when I went to Canada, but they have forest rangers who carry handguns on their hips just like police officers and come around on patrol.

What they are checking for is often violations, such as whether fish that shouldn't be taken are hidden on the boat. They came to us too, and what they were checking was the regulation that you must crush the "barb" of the hook. In short, it's to ensure the fish aren't injured by the barb.

Of course, the area and scale are completely different from Canada, but I feel that in Hokkaido, we must start thinking about protecting fish and nature conservation with that kind of mindset from now on.

When I had the opportunity to hear the Canadian Ambassador to Japan, Ian McKay, give a lecture in Sapporo recently, I mentioned this story and we hit it off, with him saying, "I fish too." In the UK and the US, fly fishing is often a hobby for people of a certain class.

In the UK, I have the impression that many university professors do it.

It originally started in the UK, but now it's more popular in the US. There are many manufacturers, and I think the population of fly fishers is also large. There are just that many locations.

When fishing overseas, do you book a guide in advance?

Yes. That way, they can take care of everything for you.

In the UK, fishing spots are often privately owned by the aristocracy. A river flows, drops into a pool, flows out, and then there is the next pool—that single unit is called a "run," and private owners lease out those runs as fishing spots.

For us to fish, we negotiate through an agent for those spots leased by the aristocracy. Reservations are often filled by the beginning of the year, and since you don't know exactly when the fish will come up, it's a bit of a gamble.

You pay an entrance fee there. In Patagonia, many people run ranches, and they raise sheep on that vast land where rivers flow through. People who want to fish there pay an entrance fee to the ranch owner.

Can you catch any unusual fish in Patagonia?

Sea trout, which are the sea-run form of brown trout, are famous. After brown trout are born in the river, they go down to the sea and return to the river to spawn; these fish in Patagonia repeat this up to eight times, so they grow very large. At first, I thought dolphins were swimming in the river (laughs).

The wind in Patagonia is so strong you can't even stand up. When the wind finally dies down a bit, you hide behind a car, lean out, and cast. If you don't consider the wind direction, the fly will end up in an unbelievable direction.

Last October, since the pandemic was over, I decided to go abroad for the first time in a while and went to the Deschutes River in Oregon, USA. There are steelhead there, which are rainbow trout that have gone down to the sea and returned. They grow to about 60 centimeters, and the fishing method is also interesting.

You use streamers or wet flies and let them drift while sweeping (an action of moving the fly as if sweeping the current), but last year I only had two bites and barely managed to catch one fish.

Steelhead are one of the dreams for anglers.

I would recommend Cuba. People from Northern Europe have built resorts there, and there are fishing guides so you can fish in the sea.

There are several types of fish, but the one with the strongest pull is the bonefish. You ride a boat that is flat from bow to stern and move through the beautiful shallow sea as far as the eye can see, using your hands to poke the seabed with a pole to row.

A guide stands at a position one level higher than the angler to overlook the sea and gives instructions like "cast at 11 o'clock" or "cast at 2 o'clock."

We don't really know where the fish are. Since they are used to seeing fish, they know they are over there or over here. This is also extremely interesting.

That's amazing. There really are many different kinds of fishing in the world.

I've been to Cuba twice and it was fun. Soma-san, how about places other than the UK?

I made some fishing friends in the US, and I once went with them to a lake on top of a mountain in Montana. Since there were no cars to get there, we loaded our gear onto horses and went up in a procession. The day before, they said to me, "Yoshiro, you can ride a horse, right?" (laughs). People around there all ride horses as if they were riding bicycles.

So I suddenly received intensive training in horse riding. We spent a day going up the mountain to fish in a mountain lake, and I caught cutthroat trout (a relative of the rainbow trout native to North America), which was fun.

The water is so transparent you can see almost to the bottom. Only the deepest part in the middle is dark and invisible. As you watch, large cutthroat trout swim slowly out from the dark area. So when fishing there, you wait while watching them come up from the depths, and catch the ones swimming toward you with a dry fly.

When I asked if they weren't afraid of bears or anything, they said, "Bears are further down. It's safe here because the altitude is high."

In Japan, on the Chitose River in Hokkaido, which flows from Lake Shikotsu, there are several small lakes where you can't launch a boat, so you fish from a floater (a donut-shaped boat specialized for fishing).

I think it was brown trout, but when you cast the fly as if hitting the shore, they come with a bang. You fish while floating on the floater all day. It was hard to go to the bathroom, but it was quite fun.

There are many different places in Hokkaido as well.

As a fly fisher, you naturally want many people to know about the things you enjoy. I think everyone has the desire to pass this fishing on to future generations.

I also hope to share this fun with young people in their 20s and 30s. The gear is a hassle, it costs money, and casting is profound, but I think it's fine to just go, regardless of how bad you are, and start by catching two or three fish for now. In extreme terms, you can catch fish even if you can't cast well.

I want many people to know the fundamental joy. That is why I also write essays.

There is an interesting book called "Trout Fishing: A Collection of American Fishing Essays," which includes a piece called the Spruce Creek Diary written by former US President Jimmy Carter. When I read it to see what a great person like a former president would write, it turns out he is no different from us.

He wakes up earlier than anyone else, goes to the river, complains about ill-mannered anglers, loses a big one, and comes home in a huff. The president is no different from us. Since we fish with the same feelings, I want to lower the threshold and have many people enjoy it.

I spent a lot of time in the UK, and not just fly fishers, but everyone around is kind to anglers. As I mentioned earlier, there are rivers where you pay a lot of money to fish, but further upstream they split into even narrower streams that are completely private land. When you want to fish there, you ask the farmer if it's okay to fish.

Then they ask, "Where are you from?" and when I say, "I'm from Japan," they are surprised, saying, "You came all the way from Japan to a place like this?" And I am always asked the same question everywhere. In Scotland, it's "Which do you like better, England or Scotland?" In Wales, it's "Which do you like better, Wales or England?" (laughs).

While I'm fishing with permission, the farmer comes by in a car, sticks his head out the window, and tells me where the fishing spots are, saying, "Further up, further up." Since the answer is already decided, they ask easy-to-understand questions because they intended to let me fish from the start. Besides the fishing itself, I think it's truly great to be able to go to places you don't usually visit and experience meeting various people.

I said earlier that not catching anything is also fun, but ultimately it's not fun if you don't catch anything. From now on, it's important to think seriously about nature conservation and to preserve the environment in Hokkaido as well.

There may be rivers that are protected by the appearance of bears, but it is important to establish firm regulations and rules, such as deciding not to take home many fish.

In Hokkaido, this is already being done at places like the Shokotsu River, but if everyone doesn't follow such rules, I think the future of fly fishing will be tough.

Fly fishing is profound even when it comes to exchanging information. It's not just about where you can catch fish, but also what kind of systems and flies you use; the amount of information exchanged with fellow enthusiasts becomes large, which is very interesting.

In that sense, I think fly fishing is a very good hobby.

The author Takeshi Kaiko often said during his lifetime, "Fishing consists of three things: luck, intuition, and persistence." If I were to add to that, it would be the connection with people that Soma-san mentioned, which is incredibly significant.

I think there are few hobbies where people who have met for the first time and have different nationalities, ages, and ideologies can become so open with each other. I would be happy if more people enjoyed it.

Nature conservation is necessary, and understanding various cultures is also necessary. I want to continue writing essays with the hope that the younger generation will understand the appeal.