By CALEB BRINTON

Sports Writer

Historically the world of fishing has been about catching the trophy fish.

However, things have changed with the growing popularity of what is known as “microfishing,” which allows fishermen to go more for diversity of species and see fish that they wouldn’t otherwise see using traditional tackle.

“A lot of people who microfish like to do what’s called lifelisting, which is very similar to people who birdwatch and keep a birding list,” said Mississippi River monitoring specialist Tony Long. “There’s a lot of unique species out there. People like to catch them all.”

Dating back to the early days of Japan, microfishing focuses on targeting what would be considered bait for your average fisherman. However, it allows for those participating to catch and view species that you would not see in traditional fishing methods.

“The goal of that was to catch a Tanago,” said Long. “It fits on a one-yen coin. A one-yen coin diameter is just about three-quarter inch. So it’s kind of similar to the size of a penny.”

Though gaining popularity and offering diversity, there are a ton of things to consider given the size of the fish averaging the size of a penny in diameter. The fish are much smaller and the idea behind this is not to catch and keep necessarily, but to see the variety of species around the state and country. The sport does require a different setup from other types of angling.

“We really started to get more people across the world engaging in this sport,” Long said. “Then websites like Tenkarabom and Anglers Emporium made gear easier to purchase online and get it shipped straight to your door because a lot of this stuff is imported from Japan. And all that combined is making it easier for people to get into the hobby.

The accessibility is huge for the sport in our region being “The Land of 10,000 Lakes,” and not needing a boat to participate is massive for a lot of new and experienced fishermen.

“We have about 160 species of fish here in Minnesota. With our 10,000 lakes, 15-plus thousand miles of fishable streams and rivers, we’ve got a pretty good range of habitat,” Long said. “In Minnesota, we’re located where several biomes converge, which supports a rich variety of wildlife and opportunities for us to explore.”

A word of caution to those who want to get started in this style of fishing is to be mindful of protected and invasive species, with Minnesota containing 160 total species with 140 of them being native.

“One thing you’ll have to be mindful of is we have trout regulations in a lot of our streams down here,” said Long. “So, you just need to be cognizant of the regulations, because in some places you can only use artificial lures and flies. You can’t use live bait. But that aside, the southeast has a very large diversity of fish. Rainbow darters, for instance.”

For more information, reach out to the Minnesota DNR and their website where they post a backlog of hosted webinars as well as important information about regulations and licensing requirements.