Jul 30

Catch & Release, Catch & Eat, and Stewardship of Our Streams - Part Three: Meeting At The Present

Written by Kazunori Okada - © 2024 Kazunori Okada, All rights reserved.

Stewardship

If you visit Japan today, you will find numerous pristine streams serving as the habitat for native trout. They were once the workplace of the shokuryoshi (職漁師, Japanese commercial river anglers), but are now enjoyed by not only tenkara anglers practicing catch-and-release, but also bait keiryu anglers who keep all their catches. How come generations of those commercial anglings there did not render these waters completely fishless? The numbers of fish they took were so high against today's standard: 7000 trout per year estimated by a master angler on Azuma River (吾妻川) from Tsumagoi (嬬恋). This is the number caught by a single angler in a single river. In many rivers famed for commercial angling, a dozen such masters were operating at the same time, so the volume of annual harvest could go as high as a hundred thousand fish, approximately. Yet these fish could still come back year after year, letting the shokuryoshi keep their productive angling ventures. This is beyond my wildest imagination against my common sense! How could that be true?

The above question touches on the relationship between catch-and-release (C&R) and catch-and-eat (C&E). Many view the practice of C&R as an integral part of protecting our own fisheries and watersheds, and being a committed steward. But how about anglers who practice C&E? Are they all void of any stewardship? And, are all C&R fly anglers perfect stewards for the wellness of fish and their environment? Things do not appear so clear-cut when you examine these matters closely.

One often ignored fact is that shokuryoshi were the best stewards of their own waters. A master commercial net-fisher in Saitama, Shuichi Moriguchi, said "A river will die when commercial anglers leave". One master after another told similar stories about conservation. When there are plenty of clear waters, many different living creatures, including fish, will thrive. Many fish will allow many people to make a living because they will invent various techniques to catch fish. People who make a living off water know everything that happens there without any help from science since they spend their lives there. So, they protect the waters and their fish because their livelihoods depend on it.

A number of the traditional shokuryoshi practices have helped to conserve fisheries, even when not particularly intended to protect their environment per se. The following lists such practices.

Shokuryoshi only caught fishable fish in the main river, focusing on quickly collecting young trout with a good marketable look and with the preferred size. Shokuryoshi called these “eager fish” de no iwana (出のイワナ) and “sighted fish" uita yamame (浮いたヤマメ). This practice helped to leave unharmed the larger-sized breeding stock that live in deeper pools so the fishery could remain robust despite the large harvests. Taking out eager small fish while leaving larger ones would also facilitate the natural selection process, making the future population biased for those that survive better and longer.
Fishing was done only in a limited summer season, mostly between late spring to mid fall. This was because the demand from local hot spring retreats was highest at these times and fish sought better price tags. Because these mountain anglers also hunted bears in the winter, foraged sprouts in early spring, and mushrooms in late fall, fish were not disturbed during their spawning season.
Fishing was done in a rotation cycle of a set of different spots. This practice came naturally when there were plenty of fish in the waters. It was enough to visit a single spot to catch enough fish for a day's job then. Fishing in a rotation of different spots helped them consistently land a stable number of fish every day. This in turn helped the fishery to manage fishing pressures, always leaving some fish in every spot to reproduce for the next year.
Shokuryoshi did not fish in edazawa (枝沢) or small tributary headwaters. Fish from these small streams were plentiful but less marketable. They tended to be dark in color because they adapt to the less sunny environment under the heavy tree covers. And their meat was also leaner due to a relative lack of food than those in the main river. This helped the ability of the watershed to maintain a healthy number of fish every year by not touching their spawning fields located in these headwaters.

These practices might be considered happy accidents: what was done for the good of their business turned out to conserve their fishery at the same time. It is remarkable to see how their practices coincide with today's conservational guidelines informed by sophisticated scientific research, just like Native Americans who had taken care of the forest unbeknownst to the Western settlers. Some anglers' commercial activities sometimes reduced fisheries as well; But, these time-tested old ways of business depended on preserving local bounties for their own livelihoods.

One of the other decisive factors that made these anglers true stewards is another traditional practice called kawawari (川割り) or simply wari (割り). To avoid unnecessary competition, it was customary to divide streams into multiple non-overlapping sections and assign each to anglers. Transgression of this agreement was treated as a serious offense and punished severely. Anglers usually respected their assignments, fishing only within their own section. Assignments were made by discussion among the master anglers who fish in the area, but also sometimes by ancient arrangements between mountain clans/villages based on generational territories with exclusive hunting rights. Since these mountain clans practiced both hunting and fishing, they often fished in the streams within their hunting territory, creating a natural division of territories. These sections/territories were inherited through their kin and friends so that there existed a master who cared for each section of a river over generations.

This sense of ownership provided a basis of stewardship as their descendants' livelihood depended on the productivity of their own section. People may voluntarily act as stewards to protect the environment out of a sense of duty and social responsibility. But when your livelihood truly depends on the environment, the act of protection becomes that of simple self-preservation. Shokuryoshi’s way of living was indeed deeply integrated into their environment.

In general, the relationship between stewards and their environment has been classically considered divided into those that manage and those that are managed. Any way of life where humans live as an integral part of an ecosystem removes the artificial divisions of who manages whom.

Still, being a steward is truly challenging because there is only a narrow gap between success and failure despite our best intentions. One good example of this is “coffee-can stocking”. Wild trout habitat is usually limited by a high waterfall that prevents trout from swimming upstream beyond it, creating a natural migratory barrier. Such fish-stopping falls are called in Japan uodomenotaki (魚止の滝) and render the upstream from it fishless. “Coffee-can stocking” refers to a practice where individuals transplant fish into the fishless headwaters above the fish-stopping falls. Japanese commercial river anglers often use this method. Despite their care, the fish population fluctuated under severe climate conditions such as typhoons and earthquakes. They exploited any opportunities to distribute bloodstock of the fish to areas formerly fishless. They always protected trout fry carefully and often transported them in their canteens or ponchos climbing up the falls. Once a new trout population became established, the new section would be annexed to the transplanter’s territory where he could enjoy exclusive fishing rights. Today, we, recreational anglers, can enjoy finding wild trout that thrive in headwaters above many obvious fish-stopping falls because of the direct descendants of the coffee-can stockings done by these shokuryoshi.

A similar fortunate event took place in the eastern Sierra Mountains in California. The Paiute cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii seleniris) is a rare subspecies of cutthroat trout that is native only to Silver King Creek and its few tributaries. The natural habitat of this trout was limited by fish-stopping Llewellyn fall, rendering its headwater above the fall historically fishless. It was 19th-century Basque sheepherders who ranged this area and coffee-can stocked what they found downstream, the rare trout, above the fall. When this rare trout was later found to be hybridized with rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) and Lahontan cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii henshawi) planted below the fall, the entire subspecies came in danger of extinction and was only saved by the coffee-can stock of genetically pure fish kept above the fall. Today, the descendants of these accidentally saved pure Paiute cutthroat trout survive in a few formerly fishless remote waters in various locations of the Sierra Nevada range after restocking to maintain their bloodstock.

This practice of coffee-can stocking is now strictly prohibited because it causes threats to native species due to genetic hybridization and resource competition. Brown trout (Salmo trutta) native to Europe and Brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) native to Northeastern US watersheds are widespread in the Western US due not only to stocking by businesses and public authorities, as described earlier, but also due to small-scale planting by anglers over time. The same goes for various native rainbow and cutthroat trout. Morally speaking, however, it is hard to argue for or against this practice with total conviction. After all, for the Paiute cutthroat trout, two different acts of transplantation, one introduced the non-native trout to the watershed and the other brought the native trout above the fish-stopping fall, shared very much the same intention but found polarizing consequences: one almost vanished it from the earth while the other saved it from extinction.

Stocking by public authorities is not free from blemish either. Over many decades, as discussed earlier in the catch-and-release section, high-elevation lakes in the Sierra Nevada mountains were stocked with rainbow and golden trout for the recreational purposes of anglers and hikers. But they have reduced the population of the native mountain yellow-legged frog (Rana sierrae) to near extinction. Regardless of our good intentions, this type of human intervention in fisheries and watersheds can cause unimaginable and disastrous results, making fishery management an exceedingly challenging task.

Let us turn our attention to our current practices. Can we learn some good insights by comparing our regulatory practice for fishery management in the US and Japan? In the US, both freshwater and ocean fishery are managed by state laws and policed by wardens who are legal law enforcers. Each state issues fishing licenses and collects fees to fund a public office that manages all the waters in the state. Both recreational and commercial fishing are managed by the same strategy. In California where I live, there is an extensive list of regulatory rules that limit seasons, methods, and size/number of takes for all recreational and commercial fisheries. In Japan, a federal law defines the structure of commercial fishing cooperatives called gyokyo (漁協 short for gyogyokyoudoukumiai 漁業協同組合) which are given the legal authority to manage a small local fishery used by cooperative members. Because of the limited size of their jurisdictions, a large number of these cooperatives spread over Japan to cover many fisheries. Recreational fishing in Japan is not governed by any laws but by these cooperatives. Freshwater cooperatives issue fishing licenses to recreational anglers and collect fees to fund themselves for their management work such as watershed repair and planting fish. Violations of rules are observed by the co-op members who do not have legal enforcement power. Japanese regulations for fish taking are more relaxed than those in the US. In many freshwater fisheries, there are no regulations for the number and the size of fish taken.

When you look at these two systems side by side, you see that the US system does much better in utilizing scientific facts for fishery conservation than the Japanese counterpart. Controlling the size and count of fish helps to preserve a healthy fishery when administered well. Legal authorities given to the US wardens also have an advantage over Japanese non-legal enforcers for administering the rules better and deterring violations. In both countries, however, what is hurting, is the lack of personnel for enforcement, leaving poachers to cause severe damage to the fishery. For the US, this is mainly because of the lack of funding. For Japan, it would be due to the aging population of the cooperative members. In either case, there is no real presence of enforcement in places that need it. This is a real issue. I believe poachers have done more damage to fish stocks than shokuryoshi have done over a century, leaving many streams fishless. Commercial anglers are often falsely blamed for depleting populations.

Another contrast can be drawn between regulatory structures. The US system is centralized by state and authoritative, while the Japanese system is distributed and community-based. The centralized authority in the US assures fairness in the way each piece of regulation and each watershed are treated but it is hard to address local issues that require flexibility and agility to allow careful deviations from the rule book. The Japanese distributed cooperatives, on the other hand, are tuned to super local needs and are more agile in structure though they may suffer from a lack of openness and fairness to the public at large. The exclusivity of the cooperative is understandable as many of them are rooted in a group of commercial anglers who discussed the division of kawawari. These are the people who have protected both their own fishery as well as commercial interests over many generations, so, it is reasonable that they treat casual recreational anglers differently from themselves.

Today, some of these gyokyo, or freshwater fishing cooperatives, are seeking new ways to manage their watersheds. Soon after commercial angling became a tale from the past, a boom of recreational fishing took place and made many mountain streams fishless by overfishing. It was these gyokyo who have worked to bring back fish in the streams by planting over the past decades. But as explained above these planting practices are difficult to manage. Consequently, their efforts have only met with limited success. Today, many cooperatives are experimenting with different approaches. Some designated C&R-only sections for recreational anglers. Itoshiro River (石徹白川) runs from the southern slope of Mount Haku or White Mountain (白山) in Gifu (岐阜) prefecture to the Sea of Japan. It is managed by Itoshiro River Fishing Cooperative (石徹白川漁業協同組合). Since 2000, they have designated and managed a catch and release section for trout fishing, one of the earliest efforts of this kind in Japan. In Aichi (愛知), the Kansa River (寒狭川) runs to the Pacific Ocean and is managed by Kansagawa Chubu Fishing Cooperative (寒狭川中部漁業協同組合). Since 2022, the cooperative has designated a major tributary of Kansa, Tomoe River (巴川), as a zoned C&R fishery, dividing the river into non-overlapping sections dedicated for different styles of fishing such as flies, lures, and bait. Others completely banned fishing in tanezawa (種沢) to facilitate trout’s natural reproduction. This practice directly follows the wisdom of shokuryoshi to preserve the spawning beds of these wild trout. For example, the Itoshiro cooperative eternally banned any fishing activities upstream of its migration-stopping fall to maintain the bloodstock of the iwana char (Salvelinus leucomaenis).

Recreational trout anglers in Japan are also organizing grassroots associations to steward their own favorite fisheries to be better managed in cooperation with local fishing cooperatives. I have visited one such association called Dando River Club (段戸川倶楽部) in 2022.

This anglers’ club, which includes well-known angler Dr. Ishigaki as a member, manages the fishery of the Dando River. This river was once the home of the beautiful wild amago (Oncorhynchus masou ishikawae) which was lost to overfishing. The situation was aggravated by wild brown trout invading from a large reservoir downstream and consuming the habitat's resources. The club began its activities in 2019 officially collaborating with Nagura River Fishing Cooperative (名倉川漁業協同組合). Only with the volunteer efforts of dues-paying members, have they managed to build and maintain access trails and a streamside club hut, clean riverbeds for spawning, and transplant amago fry to the water annually. Their hard work over five years fruited an established population of native amago trout that call the river their home once again. Working with a managing industrial partner, Clear Water Project, they are currently running citizen science studies using tags and information passed by anglers on how these planted and wild amago trout cohabitate the stream with wild brown trout. Their initial finding indicates that the native amago trout is not overly pressured by the invasive brown trout whose population has been stable.

The stricter current US regulation does help fishery conservation. However, I feel inspired by the Japanese grassroots and more local angler-led conservation efforts focusing on issues of a single stream as an alternative to a huge organization like Trout Unlimited. Similar grassroots activities are seen in the US through local fly fishing clubs and their various conservation and education efforts such as the trout-in-the-classroom (TIC) program providing a hands-on experience of fishery conservation to K-12 students. What I think of stewardship better fits this type of locally distributed model.

Now I am coming back to myself. Sitting in a room writing this part of the essay thinking of what stewardship fits me as a single angler. I have discussed earlier the beauty of how the best practice of stewardship naturally arose for shokuryoshi because they were a part of the environment that their livelihood depended on. But I am no such commercial angler who dedicates his life to it while living in it. I have a day job like most of us do. How can I then think of and find a basis to build my own practice to become the best steward for my fishing environment?

I found that respecting the diversity of opinions is the first step toward creating my own practice of stewardship. My research so far revealed that C&R and C&E are interconnected siblings when it comes to stewardship. I personally practice both and feel one is not superior to the other fundamentally. We covered a range of people who came to fishing from different places in this writing. English fly anglers, Japanese commercial anglers, watershed and fishery scientists, girls who wanted to learn fishing, fishery managers, and my uncles who led me to fishing. They all offered different perspectives to view the same questions I ask myself as an angler. Because of our differences, we need rules and regulations so that we all can share our limited and fragile resources without unnecessary quarrels. These rules become genuine, appreciated, and supported by many for a long time when we can keep them naturally without being forced to do so. Any rules to protect something become easiest to follow when protecting ourselves. This is because self-preservation is our animalistic instinct. We may not be able to truly integrate ourselves into the environment like the commercial anglers could do. But we can find diverse ways to connect to it so that our sense of stewardship comes to us more naturally and incrementally. Understanding a diversity of histories gifts us their respective wisdom for realizing this collective goal. It offers opportunities to follow their direct lineages connecting anglers to multiple past legacies. The practice of art like tenkara outside its native land opens one such path. Insights from studies like ichthyology, biology, ecology, hydrology, and geology help us examine how our actions influence the ecosystem we are integrated into. Whether positive or negative, such factual realization helps us meet the current reality as clearly as we can with the least bias. Our compassion for more non-human beings, from those little mountain frogs to those beautiful streams, helps us acknowledge our own place in this complex system of watershed fishery and helps us imagine how we can leave our own legacy in the hands of the next generation, helping them to continue the lineages. I believe that increasing our awareness about all the interconnected contexts discussed above would make us a true stakeholder and naturally enhance our sense of duty as a steward. The more we discover the wider, deeper, intricate, hidden, and abstract interconnections of all things that surround us, the stronger this sense could be.

When I am in a stream, the best moment comes when I am fishing alone. Pool after pool, I move quietly and swiftly, not disturbing any fish or any beings. My cast sends a fly into a line of flow inside the water in which I find an invisible fish in my mind. My thoughts are only occupied with the stream, fish, and myself. On one occasion, somewhere in a deep mountain, I was practicing this so absorbedly that I experienced a hard pain of hunger in my stomach and collapsed on the spot when I realized that I was fishing for over five hours straight without eating and resting. The change of physical sensations caused by a mere perception of my mind was so stark. Until a moment ago, I was moving fast and fine just like another animal hunting despite the sheer exhaustion, hunger, and limp legs that had crept up on me. At that very moment, I realized I experienced truly being a part of the environment.

There are many reasons why people fish. It can be for thrills of sport/game/hunting. Or for having another reason to be out in nature, for being self-sustaining about what you eat, for being with your loved families and friends. As I have suggested in this essay, I practice tenkara because I enjoy feeling the interconnections to all these various aspects. I owe it to numerous blissful coincidences that enabled me to be where I am with all the mountains, streams, and beautiful fish. I am truly thankful to tenkara for bringing these joys into my life. I share this appreciation with others when I impart to them the knowledge I accumulated along my path. Looking into the curious and honest eyes of those five girls at the San Joaquin makes me want to learn more so that I can explain the whole art better to them and to others I will meet in the future.

In this day of the internet, however, information about fishing travels fast and wide. Careless sharing of information could easily attract poachers and folks whose goals do not include things other than their own desires, leaving fisheries severely damaged. Stream stewardship today includes our effort towards careful communication to place the right kind and appropriate amount of information for the right purposes. I like sharing my hints and encouragement with those I meet in the streams and who need them, keeping online sharing of locations minimal. There are also many things we can do by ourselves to be a committed steward. On occasions when my fishing did not go well and I found myself skunked, I felt miserable, as all anglers do. In my effort to console myself, I have invented the practice of Trash Harvesting. When I end up skunked, I sit by the water and take in the beauty of the environment first. Then I open a plastic bag that I carry for my keeps and fill it with all the trash I find along my way out of the stream. Bringing home this bag full of trash is my true trophy catch.

In Japan, there is a concept called taruoshiru (知足), which means to "know moderation". It is considered a state of harmonious mind achievable by experienced and aged masters of whatever art we practice. Once, one of the master commercial anglers quit fishing completely when he felt that he had fished plenty in his life and became so skillful that he could take out all the fish in his stream with his rod. I have a long way to go to reach such a height of fishing skill and clarity of mind. But, someday I would like to be able to feel like this master, knowing I have done enough. Until then I will continue my journey along the creeks pondering what new discoveries might lie ahead just beyond the next bend.

About the Author

Kaz Okada hails from Nagoya Japan and resides now in Los Angeles. He is an avid angler for both fresh and salt-water fishing. His fishing experience has earned him several recognitions: two California Heritage Trout Challenge awards in 2015 and 2018, the California Supreme Master Angler Award in 2018, and three IGFA Fly Trout Slam awards (Grand Slam in 2021, Super Slam in 2022, and Fantasy Slam in 2023). He enjoys introducing Tenkara fishing to our youth and those with minimum fishing experience. When he is not traveling for his work, he loves to disappear into the foothills of Southern California and the remotest areas of the high Sierra mountains with his Tenkara rods. A member of Pier Fishing in California and Trout Unlimited. Follow his Instagram (@kazfishing) to learn more about his current exploits. For inquiries and permissions for reuse of any part of this article, please contact him at fishninjaa@gmail.com.

Endnotes

See (Tokado, 2013, p. 116) for details.

Catch & Release, Catch & Eat, and Stewardship of Our Streams - Part Three: Meeting At The Present

Written by Kazunori Okada - © 2024 Kazunori Okada, All rights reserved.

Stewardship

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