That’s it? Vacation time? Hmm… what’s the water temp at? Because if it’s too warm—like over 65°F—forget it, go for a walk along the banks, scout around if you want, but leave the fish alone! Or maybe you’re stuck grinding away solo, dreaming of vacation while parked in front of a fan… Either way, we’ve got something for you! You’re about to get a little escape, travel somewhere, see scenery you’re not used to, and start drooling at the thought of landing a monster brown trout just like the one in this film! Go ahead, order some sushi (NOT farmed salmon, PLEASE!!!), park yourself on the couch, and wait for THE World Cup soccer match… we’re taking you to Japan, and trust us, it’s exactly the change of scenery you need!
Japan is home to several native trout species, but at the end of the 19th century, brown trout were introduced to help feed the population… since then, just like in many other countries where they were introduced (Argentina, Pakistan, India, South Africa), they’ve adapted, and have often “taken over” territory to thrive there…
These days, as environmental awareness keeps growing in Japan and protecting native species has become a hot-button issue, calling certain non-native fish “beloved exotics” might come off as provocative—or even draw some serious backlash. And yet, non-native trout, rainbow trout chief among them, have generated massive economic benefits, and despite being classified as invasive species, they’ve put smiles on countless faces—so much so that you could almost call them a “national” non-native fish. On the flip side, while those economic benefits act as a kind of get-out-of-jail-free card for rainbow trout, their cousin the brown trout has seen its image take a beating, to the point of being branded a “nuisance fish” by the media. The reasoning given is that brown trout, even more than rainbows, are better adapted to Japan’s natural environments, making them a potential threat to ayu (Japan’s sweetfish) and other species. Brown trout have now naturalized in certain Japanese rivers: on Honshu, they’ve been found in the Saigawa-Azusagawa system in Nagano, as well as in the Shogawa and Jinzugawa-Miyagawa systems spanning Toyama and Gifu.
For this feature, we headed out to the Miyagawa river basin, which runs through Hida-Takayama in Gifu Prefecture, to film a fly fishing session while gathering perspectives and stories on non-native fish from Shinsuke Ijima, a river fishing guide active in the area, and Kenjiro Uraguchi, who brings a wealth of experience fishing brown trout and rainbow trout abroad.
In the Miyagawa basin, the local fishing cooperative has been running brown trout eradication efforts for several years now, officially in the name of protecting native species. But behind that justification lies a certain hierarchy of which fish are worth protecting, shaped by the cooperative’s own economic realities. What most deserves protection are surely the wild char and wild masu trout still holding on in the mountain streams and tributaries—not the ayu stocked in bulk. As for the non-native fish, they take turns playing the villain, getting eradicated, getting smuggled in and illegally stocked, getting praised, delighting kids… fulfilling their fate as “industrially managed exotic species.” In Japan’s rivers, there are native species that need protecting, and non-native species that are allowed to be loved.
Subs : Square bottom right of Youtube / Cranked Wheel: auto translate -> English.
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