Misako Ishimura

Misako Ishimura was bone in Osaka Japan. She is interested in nature, music, and dancing from her childhood. She studied Japanese traditional dance since she was four years old and obtained the title of Wakayagi Kichiichyu in classical Japanese dance in 1969. She performed classical Japan dance internationally till year of 2000.

In 1977, her love of music led her move to New York. Then Misako closely listens to live music in Manhattan and becomes a special audience. She was invited to many live music performances, including studio and live recordings in the clubs and the concert halls.

Misako caught beautiful brook trout in the beautiful small stream in Vermont. Since then, fly fishing took over her. Being a keen listener and a great observer, she becomes a part of nature while she is fly fishing. Believing in the spiritual benefit derived from activities concerning Nature, Misako Ishimura is a fly fisher who participates in organizations whose goals reflect her own regard for the environment and for community.

She was a Director of International Women Fly Fishers (IWFF) from its start and was a Chair of the IWFF/Club Liaison Committee (CLC) from 1998 to 2001. She was also a Director of Theodore Gordon Fly Fishers (TGF) from 1998 to 2003 and a Supporter of the TGF Trout in the Classroom (TIC), Wild Trout Conservation and Project Access. Ms. Ishimura's interest in the streams of the Catskills, where she fishes, participates in TGF hands-on conservation activities including stream bank restorations and planting, and organizes TIC Environmental Study Weekends, underlines her commitment to the environment and to its conservation.

Misako is Founder and President of World Fly Fishing of Japan (WFFJ), which members are located in Japan, in the USA, and in Europe. WFFJ is an affiliated to Federation of Fly Fishers (FFF) and promoting the sport of fly fishing to Japanese community. She represented Japan at the Annual FIPS Mouche World Fly Fishing Championships and Conservation Symposiums in the USA in1997, in England in 2000. Misako become a Captain of Team Japan in France in 2002, Spain in 2003, Slovakia in 2004, Sweden in 2005 and leading Team Japan anglers to Portugal in September, 2006 including two guests.

Ms. Ishimura has a certificate of fly casting instructor from FFF and teaches fly fishing and casting. She completed the Joan Wulff fly fishing casting instructors' course in 1998. She won the accuracy fly casting in 1998. She was invited to Fly Fishing Festa in Yokohama, Japan in 2002 and she thought more than 40 women anglers with Joan Wulff.

Misako learnt fly tying form Mary Dette Clerk and demonstrates her tying at the Catskill Fly Tyers Rendezvous, the SOWBUG Roundup in Arkansas, and Clearwater Junction Tyres Gathering in New York.

She also enjoys drawing and writing poetry and has contributed articles and art work to the fly fishing clubs' newsletters. Misako's chapter about Willowemoc Creek is included in A Woman's No Nonsense Guide to Fly Fishing Favorite Waters. Some of the proceeds from the sale of this book go to Casting for Recovery, a non-profit organization that assists women recovering from breast cancer. Her drawings were presented at the Wild Wood Gallery in 2002.

She was given “Certificate of Appreciation” in recognition of significant contribution to furthering relationship with the international clubs and organizations by Japan Fly Fishers, the major non-profit club in Japan, in 2003. Exemplifying her belief that women and all generations' fly fishers and their organizations are enriched and strengthened by reaching out to others across the globe, Misako Ishimura could well be considered an international ambassador of the fly fishing world.