pasir pandak part deux

decided to fish today. it was either to target the channas at sg pinang with lures or barramundi & tarpons at pasir pandak using live prawns. it will depend on the availability of live prawns. 1.30pm, i managed to buy some live prawns at tabuan jaya. thus, the latter destination was chosen. by 2.15pm, i was at pasir pandak. decided to skip the beach, instead i went straight to the place where i caught the tarpon earlier this month. the sun was bright, the water was "cantik"... perfect condition for fishing i presumed. i used two sets of tackle. one for bottom and the other outfit was for casting. a couple of hours passed and the onli fish i got was an eel. the bait kept being stolen by unknown fish. casting also zero. decided to cross the road to try the opposite body of water. i told myself, 15 more minutes and i'd packed for home. well, i put on another live prawn and cast. less than 5 minutes later... i noticed a twitched on the tip of the rod. i reached for the rod and ready myself to strike. felt a thud and i struck the rod. fish on. not much of a fight as the fish was merely a 250g palm size angcho. did the usual CPR (catch, photo and release) the bugger... and decided to call it a day as well.

my new score is 22.55 + (2 x 0.250) = 23.05

pasir pandak, 3rd march 2007

overcast skies threatened to cancel fishing plans but came afternoon, the clouds were blown away and it was sunshine all the way. by 2.30pm, me and chen were on our way to pasir pandak beach. when we reached the location, the tide was alreadi half full. experience and heresay is that the higher the tide, the chances of catching fishing from shore gets harder, but since we were alreadi there, we went ahead to fish. i did some casting, while chen rigged up for bottom fishing. the water was murky, coupled with strong head wind made casting extra challenging. well, after 30 minutes of casting, i switched to bottom fishing and was rewarded/cursed (depending on how you look at it) with a buntal.

30 more minutes at the beach and we decided move and try the mangroves along the road side instead. this was the place where i caught my first and only wild barramundi last year. water condition was good in the river system. lots of belanak could be seen swimming around. we even saw a tilapia/lohan looking fish swimming around. i tried lure casting and almost lost my favourite lure. (i think it is high time i retire the lure.)
i went over the other side of the river (separated by a twin culvert) and did casting there too but there was no action. then i switched to bottom fishing. that was when i got a surprise. as i was winding an undesirable cast, my live shrimp bait was tugged. with my polaroid glasses, i could see a silver flash. my heart skipped a beat. could it be the day i caught my second wild barramundi? i recast and retrieved slowly again. immediately, i felt the tug again. this time i waited a little while before i struck my rod. hook-up!!! and a silvery while figure torpedoed out of the water!!! and did a few more acrobatic jumps. it was a fiesty tarpon... my first ever wild tarpon!!! the fight didn't last long as my setup was mid class and the tarpon was around 750g. took photos with my trophy, tried to released it but it was gut hooked, so i brought it back for dinner. tarpons is much like the cousins to the terubok!!! lots of fine bones that can make you gag and choke if u are not careful at eating them. my advise next time to anyone who catch tarpons before... do C&R!!! anyway, i asked chen to cast to the location where i caught the fish and retrieve slowly, but to no avail. i noticed that his leader was short so that might be the reason the tarpons didn't attack his live bait. after i re-rigged, i cast to the same spot and was again rewarded with another fiesty tarpon. managed to land the bugger... but it managed to unhook itself and after a few flips on land and loosing some scales... it plopped!!! back into the river. from then on, no more takes on our offering. i figured, the fishes might have been spooked!!!

we then moved on to fresh water fishing at a pond right next to a muslim cemetary... no action there at all. around 6pm, we called it a day. thanx to chen for the pictures!!!

my tarpon, estimated 750g and after conferring with u... tarpon is top grade fish. so is 3 points per kg. so the fish is 2.25 points. so total points to date is 20.3 + 2.25 = 22.55!!!

did christmas came late or early for me?!?

depending on how one would look at it... christmas either came late or early, courteousy of santa's not so little elf... sharma. haha. didn't realised that they had post laju at the north pole but the package came by pos laju. when i opened the wrappings i was like... "sharma sent me cooking ware?... knn!!!"... but when i opened the box i saw the real presents... 4 lures and 1 fishing tackle bag. of the 4 lures, 1 is THE tasmanian devil and 3 are thailand made lures called MAN GO. the tackle bag is from surecatch... and it is one BIG bag... which i will be using during my sea trips.

so sharma!!! thanx again bro.

7th day of CNY fishing (24 Feb 2007)

felt the urge to do some casting. called noel and chen but both were busy. so i went to sg pinang on my own. brought two setups. 1 baitcaster and 1 spinning. abu d5 6600 with with daiwa vip and bakau green & yellow bushwhacker. bakau is tce's own brand. my spinning was my shimano slade coupled with a light fishing rod and attached with my trusty berkley blade dancer.

arrived at pond around 2.30pm. proceeded to the back pond. water was full as compared to the last time i was there. red tilapia can be seen everywhere as the water was clear. splashed was also everywhere... by unknown fish, which i suspect to be puyu (climbing perch). started casting and on my 3rd cast, the bushwhacker was ambushed, but i struck too early lost the fish. then one of the caretaker of the farm told me that pond was off limits and i moved to the ponds in front.

quite frustrating as i got many takes on my bushwhacker at the other pond but no hook-up. i was getting tired so i used my spinning setup to cast. then i noticed some commotion near a corner of the pond i was near to. so i started jigging my blade dancer. within a few minutes, i got a take on the lure. i hesitated the urged to strike immediately and counted to 3 seconds and was dully rewarded with a 1kg haruan right at 4pm. i snap a few photos and the fish was safely released. then i went to another corner and started casting using the bushwhacker again. there was a take on the lure and i can see the line tightened and moving off to the right. again i waited a few seconds before i struck, and another 1kg haruan was landed. again, i took photos and released the fish.

then i moved to two other ponds but the result was zero. i moved back to the pond where i caught the 2 haruans and started casting again. a few missed strikes but i didn't give up. the same corner had a commotion again, so i took the blade dancer and started jigging, immediately when i dropped the blade dancer, the line moved and a few seconds later, i struck an i got a ketutu (marble goby) of around 800g. lastly, i caught another 1kg haruan using the bushwhacker. all in all, i would say it was a productive fishing for 3 hours. i also noticed that my casting with my D5 was getting more and more effortless. (ahem!!!)

so sharma... how many points do i have? you do the math.

btw, my total score is now 20.3 points!!!

fish of yesteryears

1) sematan trip. fish is a small gopeng. caught using bottom fishing with sotong slices.

2) sematan trip. fish is an almost 1kg angcho aka tanda aka red snapper. caught using bottom fishing with sotong slices.

3) sematan trip. posing with Chen's diamond trevally. the dt weighed 3kg +. bottom fishing using market prawns / sotong slices.

4) sematan trip. fish is 800g kerapu grade A. caught using bottom fishing with sotong slices.

5) 4kg sting ray at rambungan. bottom fishing with live prawns.

6) 4kg+ barramundi at pasir pandak. my first wild barra... on lure samore. lure is caparang brand.

7) 1kg mangrovejack from kampung stoh (pay pond)... using halco sorceror.

8) assorted fish from my first ever fish sematan trip!!! bottom fishing using squid. among the catches... grouper grade A, red snapper, silver grunter and sea bass.

9) assorted fish from another rambungan trip!!! bottom fishing using live prawns and fish fillet. among the catches... grouper grade A, red snapper, bream, whiting and gelama.

kampung chupak, gunung chupak and... tasik chupak?

13 january 2007


a week earlier, i saw a pix of a location "allegedly" called gunung chupak. the place looks pristine and the best part was, it had a huge pond that looks FISHY!!!. so, a plan was setup between me and Chen to explore the place.

came saturday afternoon, we were off to find the place... based on some tourist map that Chen managed to acquire and also some google map images that Chen had "captured" and my memory of looking at the topomap from office.

kampung chupak is actually located around mile 22 kuching-serian road, near the former Dragon School. (nope... no dragons there!!!) due to our oversight... we got lost at a turning before the correct turning... so we ended up driving along jalan padawan. thankfully, we were clear minded enough to ask for directions. and soon enough we found our quarry.

from wat i can describe, the place spells Beauty with a capital B. it's actually a kampung where the locals plant paddy (as far a the eye can see). lime stone hills comes out of nowhere from the ground, and they are lushed with secondary forest. right in front of the hill (gunung chupak) is a large pond. water from the pond is controlled by flood gates so as to control the water that irrigates the paddy field.

we tried fishing at the pond but there was a lot of water plant but not a whole lot action. then we saw some local ladies pole fishing along the (earth drain, canal, channel). we went over to see their catch... a bucket full fish... mainly, puyu, haruan and barbs. so, immediately, i rigged my 14ft pole and started fishing the area. i got bites but can't seem to set the hook... until i changed my hooks to a smaller one. it was then that i consistently got fish... all in all 6 barbs.

we plan to visit this place again... with more variety of baits and also bring our scoop net and try to catch some bettas... if there are any. as for Chen... better go get ur 14ft pole... soon, so as not to miss out on the action.

p/s: sharma... i think those fishes are worth 0.5 points. wat say you???

sungai pinang farm (re-visited)

6 january 2007

2pm, chen was right on the dot at the gate of my house. packed my stuff into his old faithful... we headed for john's house. he was not ready... as usual. soon enough, we headed off to our first location, suggested by me, some oil palm plantation near uitm, samarahan area. unfortunately, the condition of the streams there weren't conducive thus we opted for another location.

it was either we go all the way to the water gates at samarahan, kiong's pond or sungai pinang farm. the latter was chosen and by 4pm... we have arrived there. going right to the action... john caught a skinny but healthy haruan weighing close to 1kg with his berkley blade dancer (fire tiger). later, chen foul-hooked a tilapia which put up a good fight. john switched to float fishing and got many small tilapia and puyu (climbing perch). i was still zero.

we all moved to the back ponds to explore. we got to 1 huge pond, way back at the farm. it was huge... as big as a football field... but it had drained, leaving pockets of water that was 1-2ft deep. lots of action on the water surface, and with polarised sunglasses, can see that the fishes around were... red tilapia (1kg+ in size), puyu, haruan and even catfish. john was the first to catch a fish, a puyu. then chen got a haruan, but as he reeled the fish in... it tried an escape trick that would make houdini proud. i was getting restless. still zero for me. then out of the blue, my blade dancer was whacked. hook-up. a fiesty haruan (500g) was reeled in. after a quick photo session, it was dully released. soon after that, chen pulled up another 500g haruan with his halco sorceror.

then on, we moved back to the front ponds. plenty of puyu and tilapia were caught but we didn't bother to take any more photos. chen did try float fishing for the huge patins, but there were no takers. around 6pm, we called it a day after a satisfying half-day of fishing.