How did you get into fishing and drawing?TK: Well, I still remember my first catch, it was a small crucian carp I caught on regular fishing gear when I was 10 years old. Later on, when I was 20 or a bit older, I was taught how to fly fish by a friend of mine. Then, I read some books and went to the river and caught a fish, I was lured by fly fishing. I started fishing almost every week in several rivers. Inspirational names from those days and on have always been Lee Wulff, Charles Ritz, Edward Grey and Koichi Saionji. Pretty much, I’ve been fly fishing for more than 30 years now.
How's the fishing close to your home in Tokyo? TK: In the suburbs of Tokyo, where I live in, I can fish in the rivers of Osino, Niko, Fukushima, Nagano, Nigata. In all of Japan you can do fly fishing. From Kyushu, and from Hokkaido, to the north and to the south. If I had to recommend something, I would go for Akita, Hokkaido, Yamagata, Shikoku and Gifu. There are native species like rainbow trout, and also the naturalized species like browns, other kinds of trout, a kind of char, salmon... The four seasons of the year are beautiful in most of the Japanese rivers and mountain streams. I love to fish dry flies there with long #3 or #4 bamboo rods, it is really big fun.
More by Takashi Kuwahara at: www.5b.biglobe.ne.jp/~inkspot
