EclecticGuy

Several weeks ago I made a quick post about the tenkara flies Dr. Ishigaki gave me at the Catskill Fly Fishing Center and Museum. I’ve had a couple of requests to follow up with the recipe, so here goes.

Materials

Hook: Tiemco 100 – sizes 16, 14, 12, 10

Thread: any large nylon or polyester thread will do. Dr. Ishigaki uses cheap nylon thread from a discount store. I have been using Danville 3/0 fly tying thread.

Hackle: India Hen, Partridge, or Pheasant soft hackle

Tying

Notice that I did not specify colors for the thread and hackle. That’s because … Continue Reading…

My new friend from Texas emailed me a few reels from his collection of early fly reels to photograph and measure. I’ve been looking for an early clamp foot reel to photograph and measure with the thought of reproducing them. I would like to have a few to fish with my wood strip rods that I make.

Well, the reels arrived today! They are much smaller than I imagined. The largest is only 1 11/16″ in diameter! One of the reels is a clamp foot and is dated to the late … Continue Reading…

Well, I just had to get the new iPhone 3G S. I’ve been an iPhone fanatic since the original came out 2 years ago. Last year, I upgraded to a 16 GB 3G and loved it. The GPS feature has been great. Well, when I heard that the 3G S has a 3 megapixel camera AND a video camera, along with a real compass, I just had to have one. In addition, the 3G S is supposed to be 2X faster than the 3G.

I … Continue Reading…

Wow, another super easy and trouble-free, automated upgrade of my blog to version 2.8! Thank you Open Source.

Daniel – owner of TenkaraUSA – emailed me some photos he took of me, my son Nick, and Dr. Ishigaki at the Catskill Fly Fishing Center and Museum. I asked for permission to re-post some of them here. These are my favorites:

The rod Dr. Ishigaki is holding is one of mine with a birch bark grip and olive wood accents and reel seat. The group shot is Nick, Dr. Ishigaki and me!

It is a little ironic that I would be posting about fly reels considering that I’ve been spending the last several weeks focused on tenkara fishing (Japanese fly fishing with a fixed line and no reel!). But I have been working on building a brass fly reel for several months using primarily hand tools. My motivation originated from the work John Betts describes in his book “Making Strip-built Fly Rods“. He only describes his reels in his original self-published version of the book, but the new hardcover … Continue Reading…

I drove to western Ct yesterday to see my daughter off on her trip to South Korea and Japan. In the morning, I got to spend 1 1/2 hrs on Macedonia Brook in Macedonia Brook State Park. This is a great little mountain stream – no wider than 15′ in most places and very tight with trees and shrubs on both banks, lots of boulders, and cascades. I decided that this would be the perfect place to try out my new TenkaraUSA Yamame rod and the flies I tied on Friday night. The flies … Continue Reading…

In my previous post, I told about my trip last weekend to the Catskill Fly Fishing Center and Museum to see Dr. Ishigaki present and demonstrate tenkara. It was a great experience. After the demo, I presented Dr. Ishigaki with a replica of an 18th century fly I tied – complete with a horsehair snell. He was delighted and in return, gave me 2 of his tenkara flies – right out of his personal fly box! It turns out that he only fishes one pattern, in multiple colors, usually size 12. Tenkara is more “presentation” than … Continue Reading…

テンカラ – Tenkara

Yesterday, my son Nick and I drove 4 hours (each way) to the Catskill Fly Fishing Center and Museum in Livingston Manor, NY to see Dr. Hisao Ishigaki give a presentation and demonstration on tenkara fishing (Japanese fly fishing). How I learned about this event and tenkara fishing is an interesting story in itself!

Followers of my blog might have seen a comment made last Thursday (May 21) by CM_Stewart on my Horse-hair Fly Line post. “Chris”, as it turns out, is an early practitioner of tenkara here in the US. He is interested in horse hair … Continue Reading…

It was another beautiful weekend of spring soccer in New England. The theme this week is “goal”. All three photos show a goal scoring play.

Pick 1

Description

A little skirmish with the keeper

Shooting Conditions

Camera model: Canon EOS 40D 
Lens: Canon EF 100-400 f/4.5-5.6L IS USM
Focal length: 100 mm
Exposure: 1/1250 at f/5.6
Exposure mode: Manual
ISO speed: ISO 400
Metering mode: Spot

Pick #2

Description

Right place at the right time.

Shooting Conditions

Camera model: Canon EOS 40D 
Lens: Canon EF 100-400 f/4.5-5.6L IS USM… Continue Reading…