Shishidome

This past weekend I went to the Shishidome fishing area near Mt. Fuji with several friends from my fly fishing class. We had perfect weather and good fishing conditions.
The first day (Saturday) we walked to the upper part of the river and fished with dry flies. I did not have any luck with the dry flies in my box, so I tried a soft hackle fly. I caught a 28 cm Iwana trout on the first cast. Unfortunately he jumped out of my hands before Mr. Sakai-san could take a picture.
The Shishidome is a stocked stream with many large hatchery raised rainbow trout which are not a native species of Japan. Many of my friends and family have commented about the small size of the fish shown on my blog. Even my own mother said "we catch much bigger fish when we go fishing". Ha! The native wild trout are typically smaller and much more difficult to catch than the stocked fish. This is precisely the reason I prefer fishing for the wild trout. However, I must say it was a lot of fun catching the large rainbows at Shishidome.
Saturday evening just before dark I saw a group of large rainbows feeding just in front of a small waterfall. I managed to take several good sized fish from this area, including a 40 cm rainbow (my largest trout to date). So I hope this satisfies those of you (mom) who wanted to see larger fish on this blog. ;-)

(close-up)

Ms. Onoue-san is a first year fly fisher also. She landed many good sized trout. Her skill as an angler has increased dramatically over the past year. Here is a picture of Onoue-san doing battle with a large rainbow.
Mr. Sakai-san landing a nice rainbow.
Dr. Kawano-sensei giving some pointers to Ms. Onoue-san.

I made several new friends on this trip and I am looking forward to seeing them again soon. Our next Lifestyle Design College fly fishing trip is in two weeks. We will be going to a fishing park to catch trout to fry at the year end party/festival the following week.