Categorization of places for fishing in Japan (Salt water)

Categorization of places for fishing in Japan (SW)

Japan is surrounded by the sea. And naturally, many aspects of Japanese culture are connected to sea life.  

Geography

Japan has a very long coastline of 29,751km, and it has nearly 7,000 islands. On its east side, there is the Pacific Ocean, and the Japan Sea on its west side. The cold and warm currents are meeting in the offshore of Japan, and they make the very rich sea environments. One of the major strong surface currents is Kuroshio, the warm current in the Pacific Ocean. This Kuroshio meets the Oyashio, the cold current from the North Pacific Ocean. 

You can see the details of sea currents around Japan here (link to the PDF about oceanography from University of Hawaii).

In terms of the sea beds around Japan, it shows big diversity. Most of the coastal areas are surrounded by the continental shelf, where the sunlight nurtures the ecosystem. However, on the Pacific Ocean side, there are several points which are closer to the trench, where the depth reaches about 8,000m. The trench runs along the northern half of Honshu (main island), and to the southward. (The ocean bottom topography data is available here.) 

Climate conditions also vary a lot. In the south, islands such as Okinawa, or Ogasawara are in a sub-tropical climate. They are like Hawaii. And in the north, the northern island of Hokkaido is in the humid continental climate zone (in Köppen climate classification). It is like the weather in central European countries. Most of the areas in Japan belong to the Asian Monsoon Zone, and it has generally warm temperatures and the distinctive four seasons.

Fishing styles

As the geographical maritime environments are diverse, there are many styles of fishing seen around Japan. Below list is not extensive but you can grasp the general idea of variety in fishing.

1. Shore fishing

This is the list of fishing styles done from the shore.

1.3 Shore fishing with baits

Fishing styles using baits are mainly categorized by the types of shore.

• Surf
• Iso fishing (fishing from rocky shore, image examples are here); iso fukase (draft or float), bottom
• Pier

1.2 Shore Lure fishing

Shore lure fishing is categorized by targets, mostly. 

• Sea bass (Japanese sea bass, Suzuki) fishing
• Squid fishing (targeting Aori Ika, Eging)
• Light rock fish and spanish mackerel
• Rickfish (Groupers)
• Shore Jigging

2. Offshore

2.1 Offshore fishing with baits

As for the casual categorization, you can see the bait offshore fishing can be grouped into these three; inshore, middle depth, and deep.

Inshore

Inshore is offshore fishing along the coast, the depth ranges from a few meters up to 50m. In this depth, the light can reach and diverse marine environments are available for fishing. These are some of the popular fishing for these ranges.

• Smaller sized fish (Haze, Kisu, flatfish such as dabs, Karei, Kawahagi leather fish, etc.)  
• Sabiki (Sardines, Spanish Mackerel, Mackerel etc.)
• Squid (Kensaki Ika)

Middle depth

To divide the depth range as middle, I take the depth of 50m to 150m. Since the water tends to bring more oceanic conditions, and target fish sizes tend to be larger. 

• Fishing with chumming (Bream, small Japanese Amberjack or Kingfish, etc.) 
• Rockfish (Kasago, Kijihata, Oni-Kasago)  
• Fishing with live bait (Tuna, Bonito, Japanese Amberjack, Kingfish, etc.)
• Squid fishing

Deep

In the depth, we have attractive fish species. They are often Japanese people’s favorite fish because of their special taste. 

• Deep sea fishing (Kinmedai,  Akamutsu, Kuromutsu etc.) 

2.2 Offshore lure fishing

Inshore lure fishing can be taken as the extension of the shore lure fishing. But actually it is more than that. Now the famous fishing methods such as Tenya, Tai-Rubber, and Inchiku, are all coming from this. 

And when you look at the southern area, the world famous casting game fish such as Dorado (Mahi Mahi) and GT are available in Japan. On the contrary, the Hokkaido area (Northern Island) has salmon for the target.

• Inshore

Casting, and Bay Jigging (Seabass, Bream, Rockfish, Amberjack, Salmon etc.)

• Jigging (Tuna, Japanese Amberjack, Kingfish etc.)
• Casting (Tuna, Dorado, Japanese Amberjack, GT)

3. Summary

Japan lies 4000km in south-north direction length, from semi-tropical to semi-tundra climate. The sea water environment is also diverse, area by area. It is not easy to categorize them, and each of them requires detailed description, for you to get the better ideas about them. Each category will be explained in the future. If you have any request of fishing style for me to explain first, please let me know.