Summer of the last season

[njtrout]

Thank you Satoshi, for your answers. Your description of the Iwana makes them seem (to me) even more like the brook char/trout found here (S. Fontinalis).

A few more questions:

1) Do you ever fish, or, have you ever fished, immediately post-thunderstorm in the summer for Iwana? if you have or do what flies and/or tactics are most successful?

2) During the spawn do young males 'swarm' around and try to mate with a larger/older female when the paired male is not next to her? Also, at what age do they first attempt to spawn? (males and females).

3) Do the larger Iwana tend to seek the deepest water and 'bulldog' it there when hooked? Also, as they grow larger do they tend towards a football (American) shape and use that shape (with the current) as leverage and fighting?

Thanks

FYI - I find learning about another stream dwelling temperate zone char fascinating.

[Satoshi]

njtrout,

I'm happy to answer your questions.

1) Do you ever fish, or, have you ever fished, immediately post-thunderstorm in the summer for Iwana? if you have or do what flies and/or tactics are most successful?

I have never encountered such a situation before, unfortunately. My brother once told me he experienced such a fishing; He was fishing in a mountain stream when the water was very low and fish were very inactive, but after the storm, the stream just exploded with iwana. I didn't ask him the fly he used, or how he fished, but I guess anything on the water would have worked in such a condition.

2) During the spawn do young males 'swarm' around and try to mate with a larger/older female when the paired male is not next to her? Also, at what age do they first attempt to spawn? (males and females).

I don't know whether young males prefer larger females, but because males tend to mature earlier than females, a newly matured young male naturally dosen't have a female that match the size of it, and, he has to mate with a larger or older female just like many other salmonid species.. In other words, he has to be a "sneaker". I don't think there is no place where there are so many iwana that young males "swarm" around females, at least in Japan.
Iwana, both male and female, sexually mature and spawn at 2+ autumn, that is, after about 3 years after hatch. Fast growing males may mature at 1+. These are the figures for land locked fish.

3)Do the larger Iwana tend to seek the deepest water and 'bulldog' it there when hooked?

Yes, that is exactly a large iwana does.

Also, as they grow larger do they tend towards a football (American) shape and use that shape (with the current) as leverage and fighting?

No, unlike brook trout, iwana usually remains thin even when they grow very large. Large iwana looks somewhat like giant loach.

Satoshi

[njtrout]

Flies...anything other than dries.

What do you use for Iwana? Also, how and when (seasons and conditions) do you fish them?

I realize this could be a book (or at least very long article). :) But, I'm curious.

[Satoshi]

Flies...anything other than dries.

What do you use for Iwana? Also, how and when (seasons and conditions) do you fish them?

I realize this could be a book (or at least very long article). :) But, I'm curious.

njtout,

I almost always use size 14 bead-head hares ear for iwana. When I fish deep pools, I use heavily weighted #10 bead-head hares ear. I have never felt the necessity of other types of flies. When I fish yamame or amago, I use either a #16 bead-head hares ear or a tundem rig with a heavy bead-head hares ear and a #18 phesant tail trailed behinde the heavy nymph. Yamame or amago takes the smaller phesant tail in 4 out of 5 times. But iwana doesn't seem to have such a preference.
Because I don't have iwana within the range of a day trip, and because iwana live in colder waters (upper reaches of a stream than amago or yamame), I start to go fishing iwana at around the end of May, when the water temperature rises high and fishing amago becomes tough. Before that time, dry fly fishing is unpredictable. You can fish iwana anytime in the season (from March through September) though. People go fishing for iwana in March, when most of the land along streams is still deeply covered with snow in regions where iwana dwell. In hot summer months, particularly from late July to August, fishing may become slow in places. The best season would be June, particularly in a short window of around 2 weeks between the end of snow run-off and the start of a rainy season.

Satoshi

[njtrout]

Thanks again for answering my questions.