2026 has entered its sixth month. It seems like the new year had just begun and now we’re suddenly looking summer square in the face. This felt like a good time to take stock of what’s going on around here at Tenkara Angler and talk directly with you, our community. Please consider this a two way conversation. I’d love your thoughts in the comments section, and there’s a short survey at the end if you’re willing.
The Honest State of Things
As Editor-in-Chief, I can be Tenkara Angler’s harshest critic. But looking back over the last few years, I’m generally happy with what this little experiment in amateur media has become.
Our editorial team has now grown to include several distinct voices from across the country. Amanda, Anthony, Bill, Matt & Tom are all amazingly creative people who have each become very good friends. We’ve largely held to our publishing cadence of two or three articles a week, a monthly podcast, and an annual print magazine. That sounds straightforward until it isn’t, and anyone who’s stared down a blank page knows exactly what I mean. We published our first women-only podcast episode last week, which felt like a genuine milestone.
What continues to excite me most, though, isn’t what our team produces, it’s what you contribute. The community submission pipeline remains robust, and the one-on-one connections I make working with authors behind the scenes are among the most rewarding parts of running this thing. Crowdsourcing authentic voices was always central to Tenkara Angler’s original intent: to give your contributions a more durable home than a social media feed. We’ve got contributors filing regular reports from Japan, a roster of thoughtful regulars pushing the conversation forward, and numbers that show slow, steady community growth.
That part feels right, but some other parts don’t.
Where We’re Falling Short
Social Media
Our social presence is essentially an article feed, and I think we can all agree that’s not enough. I’m not suggesting Tom Davis starts dancing on TikTok, but I do think we’re missing real opportunities to connect with the part of our community that lives in those spaces. What platforms do you actually use? What kind of content keeps you engaged when you’re scrolling? I’d genuinely like to know, because right now we’re guessing.
YouTube
The channel has become our primary podcast home, which is fine, but it was supposed to be more than that. A few weeks ago we released a short trip video from Wisconsin. The response surprised me. People watched, shared, and responded to it. There’s clearly an appetite for video content that goes beyond the podcast. Trip films, fly tying, technique breakdowns, short vlogs? I want to make more of it, and more consistently. What would actually make you click?
Better Storytelling, My Own Hesitation
This one’s personal, and I want to be honest about it. When I started Tenkara Angler, the vision was long-form storytelling. Not gear reviews or how-to articles. Actual narratives, the kind you find in The Drake or The Flyfish Journal. We get some of that, especially in the print magazine, but the website has drifted away from it.
Recently I wrote a seven-part series and published it on my personal blog instead of here. If you’re wondering why, the honest answer is that I talked myself out of it. Our analytics suggest readers don’t stick around for longer pieces, and I let that number make the decision for me. But I’m not sure that’s the right call. Data tells you what people do, but it doesn’t always tell you what they want, or what they’d respond to if you gave it a real chance. Do you enjoy longer reads? Would you come back for a serialized story? I’d rather hear it from you than keep deferring to a bounce rate.
An Annual Event
I’ve thought for a long time that there should be a centralized Tenkara Angler gathering. A Tenkara-Con, if you will. The regional campout model seems to be gaining real momentum, which is wonderful. But I wonder if there’s room for something bigger and more intentional. If we built it, would you come? Where should it be?
Affiliate Relationships & Editorial Integrity
Running an independent media brand isn’t free, and I want to be straightforward with you about how Tenkara Angler sustains itself. We maintain affiliate relationships with most U.S.-based tenkara companies. When a reader clicks an affiliate link in one of our articles or the Gear Shop and makes a purchase, we receive a small commission, at no additional cost to you. That revenue is what keeps the publishing cadence going.
What it doesn’t buy is editorial influence. We don’t accept payment for positive coverage, and we won’t write favorably about a product that hasn’t earned it through actual use. Affiliate links are placed contextually, within articles we’d be writing regardless not as thinly veiled advertisements.
That said, I’ll be honest about a tension that exists: brands that reach out to us directly tend to get covered more often, simply because the conversation gets started. That’s not a policy, it’s a byproduct of how things work in practice, and it’s worth noting.
Do we come across as too commercial? Are there brands we undercover, or ones we give too much airtime? Where do you feel the line between editorial and affiliate content gets blurry?
A Few Other Things I Keep Coming Back To
Over the years we’ve taken runs at merch, gear collaborations, giveaways, and digital downloads. None of it really landed, partly because we never committed to any of it fully. I’m not ready to abandon those ideas, but I want to be smarter about which ones are worth revisiting.
So let me ask it plainly: how can Tenkara Angler provide more value to you? What tenkara-related problem are you trying to solve that we could actually help with? That question is more useful to us than any list I could generate on my own.
Eleven Years
Tenkara Angler has been around for almost eleven years. The first post announcing the first print issue went up in August of 2015, which is still unbelievable to me.
A few years ago I wrote a piece called Tenkara’s Future Outside of Japan that urged those of us that loved tenkara to advocate for it. I was worried interest in tenkara was fading. I was wrong, and I’m glad to be wrong. The outdoor surge that followed COVID propped things back up and brought new people into the fold, and the community that’s formed around this style of fishing feels more alive than ever.
I want Tenkara Angler to keep up with that. To represent this community the way you’d actually like to see it represented. That only works if you tell us what that looks like.
Fill out the survey below if you’re willing. And whether you do or not, thank you for being here.
Do you have a story to tell? A photo to share? A fly recipe that’s too good to keep secret? If you would like to contribute content to Tenkara Angler, click HERE for more details.
Discover more from Tenkara Angler
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.