TENKARA FLY-FISHING: Strategies, Tactics & Flies
ON FISHING KEBARI “The short version is to be creative and try different things until you find out what the fish want. It's not rocket science.” Anthony Naples
ROB WORTHING, MD "Skill in choosing kebari means little without the skill to employ it on the water. Remember the Oni kebari? Alternatively, sinking or floating a fly takes a certain skill level regardless of how the fly is tied. Masami Sakakibara has spent decades developing that skill. Manipulation technique is highly prized among tenkara anglers. Developing technique is more valuable than any choice of gear. The manipulation technique involves how the water acts on your kebari and how you influence those actions. Like a puppet on a string, like two dance partners learning to tango, whatever analogy is applied, the bottom line is the same. A winning combo comes easiest to those tenkara anglers who know how to play with small currents, large currents, no current, and everything in between. Begin with the dead drift. The dead drift involves allowing a fly to move naturally within a current absent of any evidence it is tied to a rod. But it is connected to a rod. The rig that attaches it, no matter how ultralight, is an object with mass and surface area. That object is subject to the forces of wind, water, and gravity. The forces acting on that rig will invariably influence the drift of the fly that's tied to it. Therefore, to achieve a perfect dead drift, a drift that is absent of any perceivable outside influence, you have to counteract the force of your rig on the fly. You have to use manipulation to apply an equal but opposite pressure. These forces change from moment to moment, and so must your manipulation. A perfect dead drift may very well be the hardest thing to accomplish in fly manipulation. The process of striving to achieve it may very well be the most powerful tool for building fly manipulation techniques. When you feel ready, try pausing the fly in the current. Don't allow it to drift downstream; don't pull it upstream. Just let it sit there. See how the
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