Back to Shoal Creek

by Mike Schelp
(Gladstone, MO)

Kansas City has built a lot of paved walking trails, many of them along small creeks. This is where I go tenkara fishing. This is the Shoal Creek Trail from the Maple Woods trail head. About 1/2 mile down the trail is one of the spots where you can easily access the creek. Even though we’ve had a LOT of rain the last three weeks, the water was low and I was able to fish along about 1/2 mile of creek. I was using my Shimotsuke Kiyotaki 18. The line was about 3.5 meters off the heavy end of a Daiwa Tenkara Taper 0.8 - 4.0 go. This is an inexpensive (2 lines for $10) line that is 7 meters long. The Kiyotaki cast the heavy half beautifully! About 4 feet of 7X tippet and assortment of size 18 and 20 killer bugs and Kebari rounded it all out. I caught about 30 fish in two or so hours.

“The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten” - Benjamin Franklin

"Be sure in casting, that your fly fall first into the water, for if the line fall first, it scares or frightens the fish..." -
Col. Robert Venables 1662

As age slows my pace, I will become more like the heron.