2007 Apr to May - DURIANS and Fishing Log

April to May 2007 - Giant Garoupa and Kurau... Wow!

30 June - a nice Threadfin Salmon

- went with Kings and Norm and the whole gang! 9 of us on the boat this time around, and there was plenty of action, but the quality wasn't always good.

Stingray Man was lucky for the day with a good Threadfin Salmon

Altogether there were more than 50 fish, none were wasted. All were eaten, including the catfish. I landed a big Gemang (Giant Eel-tailed Catfish) which was my excitement for the day.

Here's a pile of fish about to be sorted

But I guess the highlight of my day must have been the closing of the National Stadium that night. After taking a shower at home, my whole family made our way down to watch Australia defeat Singapore in soccer, then stayed for the fireworks and closing party at the National Stadium... Boy, do I have fond memories of this place. At least we did the Kallang wave one last time.

Berkley enjoys some seaweed as we watch the proceedings

20 June 2007 and 23 June 2007 - trip with friends

On the 20th, Kho came along and landed a nice Golden Snapper.

Kho is finally convinced there are still fish in Singapore

And then, at a fast current spot, I had just set my bait when my rod began to twitch. "Small fish," I said. And then (whenever I say that magic word, something big goes...see the GT story on the left) my rod went into a huge bend.

"What SMALL FISH???" everyone else shouted. The fight was on.

The fish took drag and was a real fast swimmer. And when I tried to pump it in, I could feel true power. This felt like a big fish alright! Then, after a good fight, the fish surfaced and surprised everyone, it was a pretty decent sized GT just slightly over a kilo, and it fought like a 5 kilo fish!

GTs are really strong fish, and when they get to this size, I guess the power begins to emerge. Well, here's another Singapore GT... not big, but still strong.

Great fighting Giant Trevally junior

Then on Saturday 23rd, though a few guys backed out at the last minute, we still went fishing. Han came along and we caught many Tiger-toothed croakers (which are quite good-eating too).

Han holds one of the five tiger-tooth croakers we landed that day

And then there was a storm, and then I started catching good fish almost non-stop all around Changi. Caught two big Golden Snappers in a row, then two decent Sweetlips, then Han caught two Grunters, then I landed a big Silver Croaker (fish of the month). Total... 17 good fish + 20 other catfish and other stuff. Looks like a good season of fishing.

Here's a peek into my icebox full of quality fish... good way to end the holiday season... now it's back to work

19 June 2007 - Trip with Felip .

Felip called and we went out for a trip in windy conditions. Despite the rough conditions, we had a good conversation, reminiscing our 16 years of fishing together. I used to follow him on his boat when I was still in Secondary school. Amazing how time flies! Now we both are learning to strike a balance between work and play, and that's why we fish.

Oh ya, we both caught big Snappers each.

Here's a hard pulling Snapper I landed using Selar flesh (the Selar I caught at Sembawang beach a few weeks back... saw the pic?)

True A-grade fish... Golden Snappers

15 Jun 2007 - short trip with Bren

- managed a short trip with Bren and landed a nice Silver Croaker and Grunter, and plenty of other stuff, some strong fighters too.

Bren and me pose with another rare SILVER CROAKER... been eating them, tastes good!
31 May 2007 - Vesak Day short morning trip with Kings for Silver Croaker, and then a short pond recce trip in the afternoon with Wayne

After dropping my wife off for her morning round of golf, I did some putting practice, then headed for the boat to tie some hooks and wait for kings. He came at 0830 hrs and we zoomed off for bait and headed to the place we landed Silver Croaker at just a few days back.

Over the spot, I had a good bite just 10 minutes after setting my lines, and fought up a very nice table sized Garoupa.

Another nice Garoupa for dinner

Then caught some catfish for Sam, and then some Gelama (Bearded Croaker), and then around 10am, the real target appeared. I had a good pull, and enjoyed a nice fight from a pretty big Silver Croaker, and when the fish surfaced, it was simply amazing. It's really a beautiful fish!

Here's a nice big Silver Croaker to join my Garoupa for dinner

Mission accomplished, so we headed back by around 11am.

Here's how the Silver Croaker matches up to our standard Gelama (Bearded Croaker)... see any differences?

After washing the boat, fetched the wife from the club, she played well... then fetched the kids, went to some shopping centre, then still felt an itch to fish, so I managed to get Wayne to join me on a recce pond trip, paid $10 for an hour of catch and release fun.

Here's Wayne trying to release a nice Grass Carp I caught after a fun fight

But we did see a huge Catfish being landed, and I made a mental note to come here again.

28 May 2007 - Trip to the Beach

just for fun, I brought the kids to Sembawang Park Beach, and while they played with sand, I walked to the jetty where I used to catch crabs (wonder if there still are crabs here), used some dead prawns as bait, and soaked a line.

Not many bites, except from some small fish, so I switched to tiny hooks and landed some weird brown small fish about 4cm long on average. In fact, I caught about 5 of them in total and threw them back. Then one tough fish took my bait and I had some fun fighting up an unexpected Selar.

Then a Tamban school came along for a short while and I managed to foul hook a few of them. I think they'll make good bait, haha.

Here's the day's catch, still very fun for me.

Who says you need big fish to have fun?

26 May 2007 - Usual Saturday Trip, unusual fish makes an appearance...

 Des brought young Luke, Wei Khong brought David and young Joel, and we headed out for a day of fishing fun.

At the Changi reef, the action was quite hot, but only poor quality fish were landed. Plenty of Chocolate hinds turned up to give young Luke some thrill. Of course there were Russell's Snappers too, but the big fish were not to be found, so we shifted to a deep reef for Garoupa...

But no big Garoupa turned up, only Khong's rod took a nice pull and he managed to land a pretty good sized Waigeu Sea Perch (Deepsea Barramundi).

Khong shows us his Perch

We moved around quite a bit, trying to find the good stuff, but finally had to drop Kings off early cos he had an appointment with his wedding planner. (will we be seeing less of Kings soon? I wonder...)

Anyway, short on petrol, we moved to a deep channel rock again to wait for the big ones, and finally some good stuff appeared.

I was sitting beside Luke's rod when it took a violent shake, and so I struck for him and passed him the rod. Young luke fought the fish valiantly to the side of the boat and we landed what looked like a Mulloway (jewfish),(But I did some research and found that it was a different species of Croaker, a Silver Croaker... which is a rather rare (locally) relative of our Gelama (Bearded Croaker) and the Tiger Tooth Croaker. SO.... here was a silver croaker (My Ubin Jewfish record still stays intact, haha) of a nice size, and into the baitwell it went.

Here's Des and young Luke (only 2 yrs old) with a rare Silver Croaker (Father and Son Combo 1)

Then Joel struck into another Silver Croaker and fought it up to the boat.

Joel and his Dad David pose with another Silver Croaker (Father and Son Combo 2 - notice both boys are wearing similar colours)

And as we tried to settle down again, Khong got busy once more with a strong fish at the front of the boat.

Khong takes his time enjoying the fight of the fish

And here's what he landed, a slightly Yellowish Grunter, but still a decent Grunter

So we still landed some nice stuff after all. Yeah!

19 May 2007 Didn't intend to fish today cos had badminton training in the morning, but Kings managed to tempt me to go on a Stingray hunt so that we could have a nice ray for the exciting Saturday evening BBQ at King's place.

So by 2pm, we were on the flybridge cruising towards the sandy patch where I knew the stingray lurked. Almost immediately after anchoring, the fight action began, with several fish over a kilo.

I opened accounts with two Jahan (Giant Catfish) over 2 kilos each and placed them in the blue well for Sam. Then Kings had a good take and a fish fought well. When it surfaced, we whooped for joy when we saw a HUGE flathead. This is really the best fish for a BBQ, nice firm tasty flesh. SHIOK! (This is a highly prized food fish down under, but so far it hasn't caught on in Singapore, so luckily there are flathead that grow to good sizes in Singapore, cos people don't target them here, haha.) Anyway, that fish was really the champion dish for that night's BBQ. Well done, Kings!

Here's Kings with the best fish of the day, a really good flathead

Not to be outdone, I landed a few more Jahan and a Gemang (Giant Eel Tailed Catfish) for Sam, and then my light rod took a great bend and I thought the ray had arrived, but when I struck, the drag went in bursts, and I could feel violent headshakes, so I fought the fish carefully, and was pleasantly rewarded with a big Grunter.

Here's a biggie Grunter to add on to the BBQ

But of course the best was yet to come. At closing time, my stingray rod finally took a huge pull and the line started flowing out smoothly. This was a good ray, no doubt about it. Our staple for the BBQ was finally here.

After a decent fight, the perfect sized white-spotted ray surfaced and was promptly de-barbed and put on ice for the night's feast.

This was the icing on the cake, after a pretty good short afternoon trip... a nice BBQ sized ray

12 May 2007 - Melvin and gang came on board and his dad was the champion of the day, 

... with many Russell's Snappers, Timun, Fusiliers (Hang Tze He), and all sorts of coral fish.
The fish were small but the bites were plenty, and the highlights of the day included a baby GT on lure, plus another slightly bigger GT lost after the hooks straightened on the lure.

When Baby GTs (Giant Trevally) like this appear, we know the water condition is not too bad

Of course, I landed some good sized stuff like a nice Parrot Fish from one of the rare clean reefs from Changi waters and a Handsome Golden Snapper to top off the pile of fish.
Here's the catch, not many big fish, but plenty of fish nonetheless.

1 May 2007 - Labour Day fishing with special guests Wilson and Renee from Montana.

Wilson has experience as a fly-fishing guide in Montana, and we enjoyed a good day out at sea, sharing fishy tales.

In fact, Wilson opened accounts with a nice Garoupa. Then the action began. Sherman was very proud of his big Golden Snapper which we had for dinner that night. Of course there were misses, but Con delivered the goods again, with a Garoupa and a Golden Snapper too. Kings was not to be outdone, and contributed a good Grunter to the tally. But the fishing was just the sideshow, the guys went on some sightseeing cruise and even stopped at the farm to enjoy a chat with the Aunty.

Here's the cruiser at the farm, with Ariel manning the flybridge

Con holds up two of the Golden Snappers while Wilson and Renee look on... these Snappers are good sized for the Ubin area

And of course, after a fun trip, everyone helped with the washing up, and we headed the King's place for a nice dinner and white wine.

Not many things beat the taste of your own freshly caught fish, especially a nicely steamed Golden Snapper

Bon voyage, Wil and Renee... who are off to Myanmar. Take care, my friends.

28 May 2007 - Norman, Iggy and Iggy's friends...

came along for a Saturday trip. This trip was not too bad.

The rays of the early sun broke through the clouds in patches. The dark clouds were ebbing away, remnants of the night's storm. A lone flybridge cruiser cut through the waves towards the choppy waters off Changi, with a crew of anxious anglers hoping for a decent catch.

At the deep oceanic rock, Captain Con positioned the cruiser nicely ahead of the structure and, calculating the wind and current vectors in with his mental calculator, dropped the anchor knowing that the lines would drop into the bite zone.

"Lines down!" announced the steady Captain as he whipped out his trusty rangong and clipped it onto his snap swivel. "We're gonna get good stuff here," he added.

Not ten minutes after all lines were baited, Iggy grunted and his rod took a mighty bend. Everyone could tell that line was being stripped from his reel because his drag was really loud. "Must be a big one!" said Norman, as he prepared the landing net. Soon, the fish tired itself out and surfaced. It was a big Grunter over the Kilo mark.

"Good fish there," said Captain Con, as he unhooked the fish and slipped it into the live well.

Iggy puts full pressure on the fish

After that, the action picked up and everyone started catching fish. A big Garoupa was landed by none other than the Captain himself, and someone added another nice Garoupa. Then Con landed a beautiful Golden Snapper soon after. Within a short bite period of one hour, everyone had landed some good fish except poor Ian. But he was going to make some good contributions later.

Iggy and Con hold up some nice Grunters and a good dinner-sized Garoupa

Norman was itching for Barramundi, so he requested that Con bring him to the Barra spot, where Norman had witnessed several Big Barra being landed by Con and other anglers. In fact, Norman had landed a Barramundi there himself, so he was hoping for another one. Unfortunately, the water closer to shore was rather polluted, probably due to the overnight shower, and the bite rate was slow at the Barra Spot. Out of the blue, Iggy's drag was screaming again!

"Hey guys, I've got one!" shouted Iggy as he pumped in something heavy. It turned out to be a fat Blue-spotted ray, one of the tastiest rays around, and this one had meat. So after Captain Con skillfully plucked off the two stings on its tail, the ray was left to swim in the metal well, where it gave birth to another beautiful small ray. Con pointed out that this was quite common among rays and that the baby should be released to grow up, so Norman carefully released the baby into the shallows.

Here's the mother ray (right) with the newborn baby ray in the blue well(left)

"Ok, let's get some action," said Con after a while, and they headed into clean water once again. And just five minutes after setting the anchor in the Grunter Zone, the action began.

Norman was first with a good Grunter, then Ian finally caught his Grunter, and another one immediately after that! There was plenty of fight action because a huge school of Marine Catfish soon made its was under the boat, and double hookups were common. The guys really had fun fighting these big Catfish up to the boat and releasing them.

The guys ran out of bait early and so they returned to the boatel early to wash the boat down and take some pics.

Here's a part of the catch, some fat Garoupas and Grunters

21 Apr 2007... after a 2 week hiatus, I'm out on the TrevaBerkley once again.

Went to Selangor for an intensive badminton training trip with my team, played with Bukit Jalil and some State Juniors, but now I'm back to Saturday fishing.

Fishing pro Dave, his sidekick Alex, Kings and me met up at the boat around 11am and launched the boat for a Saturday afternoon trip. This was going to be a great trip in more ways than one!

After zooming straight to Johor Shoal, we settled down to fish and the water was really calm. Then, very quickly, the bites began. Alex was really on a roll, bringing in plenty of Bream, then I landed one Bream too and we landed a number of them after an hour.

Then Dave brought out the secret weapon, DURIANS!!! 'My goodness! How to eat durians on the trip?' I exclaimed. Well, there's always a first time, and we all dug in. What succulent flesh, what strong flavour, these were perfect durians man. Take a look!

Yummy durians, these are perfect ones, thanks to Dave the Durian Hunter, we really stuffed ourselves with durians till we nearly exploded... I brought two remaining durians home for the family too

After eating our fill, I shifted the boat into the structure a little, and the real action began. It was evergreen Alex again (who, I must add, kindly spliced my anchor rope for me so that now I can use the balloon system efficiently)... who had a strong tug and fought up a hard-pulling Garoupa. But Dave handled the fish for the photo.

Here's Dave with Alex's Garoupa... just right for dinner

Along the way, Alex landed more good stuff like Snappers and even a young Giant Trevally, which can put up a really good fight. Meanwhile, Kings and me were entertaining ourselves at the front of the boat, catching Bream when I lost a huge bite which almost yanked the rod out of my hands, but the hooks pulled, and I lost the fish. I cast to the same spot and didn't catch the biggie, but caught a nice Flathead instead for dinner (delicious fish!).

Here's the Juvenile GT with my Flathead in the baitwell

We moved around a little and Alex even managed a Spanish Flag Snapper (Timun) which he laughed at cos he catches plenty of these in the Southern Islands. Then he had a strong take again and he slowly fought a tough fish to the side of the boat. The unmistakable flash of silver meant a pelagic on the other end, and soon a big Diamond Trevally was in the baitwell.

The Chermin couldn't survive in the baitwell, so I packed it for the ice box

Alex finally agrees to pose with one of his fish... looks like the Snapper are really back!

After a number of fish, I drove the boat to another deepwater spot to target Coral Trout, but no coral trout appeared, just some other good stuff. It started with Alex and a Golden Snapper, then Kings had a strong take, and the fight was on.

Kings shows us how to handle a strong fish

And Kings landed a really fat 2 kilo Garoupa which was actually chasing the Hind caught on the top hook.

How's this for a double-header? Fat Garoupa

I too had a nice bite and landed a healthy Waigeu Sea Perch (Reef Barramundi) and, with a baitwell full of swimming fish, we headed back to shore early. Our stomachs full of durian, and our ice-boxes full of fish.

No Barramundi? Get Waigeu Sea Perch also can, a cousin of the Barra

What a great day! More days like this please.

1 Apr 2007

A meet up with an old friend Razali (see the GT story) under the Penjuru bridge showed that the Southern Island fish are still biting and are as big as ever. Here, Razali's friend holds up a 20kg Garoupa that Razali landed during the night trip. Many big Golden Snappers and Garoupas were landed during the trip, and I brought one Goldie and one Garoupa back for dad.

Here's Raz's small Garoupa, cos my thumb is just as big as the fish, haha

I'll probably go out with Razali again soon, before the June Monsoon kicks in.

2007 Jan to Mar - Big Barras! Erwyn's debut

Jan to Mar 2007 Fishing ... Big Wild Barras... have you ever tangled with one of these?

March 2007 update- The fish are coming back...

after a recent oceanic virus outbreak wiped out Snapper stocks all around Ubin, causing almost total wipeouts at fish farms along the South Ubin Farm Line. Well, that was during the February period, and the action seems to be picking up.

Here's a tasty Tiger Tooth Croaker I landed compared to a standard Gelama (Bearded Croaker)

The April catch got even better though, but before I update those reports, here's a few interesting pics during the March fishing adventures.

Karen shows that the Snappers are coming back, with this healthy gleaming Onga

Went for a few short trips in March, landed Snappers and Grunters, but the interesting one must be Mike's strange Snapper (below).

What's this fish? Looks like a Timun (Spanish Flag Snapper) but the pattern is different and the colour is much darker.

Well, I did a little freshwater fishing, lost 2 huge Featherbacks (Dao Yu) cos my hooks straightened on the White Rabbit lures, so now I know I must change the hooks on these soft plastics. But I landed a soft-shell turtle instead, poor guy, quickly released him unharmed.

Poor greedy chap, so aggressive, it was not easy to unhook and release him, but we did it.

Of course, back in deepwater, on one of the trips to Johor Shoal, Mike, Matt and me had some fun landing half a dozen Grunters and other assorted species.

Matt's fish goes on a run... look at the bend!

Mike also has a solid hookup and a drag-puller

On that trip out to Johor Shoal, we did land some good stuff, but forgot to take pics of the actual fish, so we only have the action shots, haha, so I guess PY's Grunter on the next trip has to represent the Grunters we all landed.

PY had a great kick fighting this fat Grunter to the boat

Well, I'll update the April stories later today maybe, have a great catch story to tell... the Durian Hunter strikes!

feb2007 update - Been real busy lately

... work, fishing, golf and badminton... so I have so many stories to tell but so little time to tell them. Anyway, my boat's engine gave way in Feb and had to spend some money repairing the old thing, and I had time to clear my freezer slowly by eating fish. Also spent some time doing land-based fishing with the kids. Will slowly write in the march and april stories when time permits.

Here's my standard Grunter meal with instant noodles, yummy!

This helps to clear the freezer.

Of course the boat is up and running already, and we landed some good stuff after the Snapper virus outbreak around the CNY period reduced Snapper stocks around the Ubin area. But I'll start with the simple stuff.

Went to explore the new Bottle Tree Park. The catch rate was very poor when I walked around asking about the catch. Many anglers were disappointed with zero catch but there were one or two anglers with a fish on a string and they too were upset that the bite rate was so slow. But anyway, my kids had fun. And this is why.

My daughter and her good friend Ade hold up their catch of Swordtails, Guppys and Mollys

The kids had great fun trying to catch the small fish with little nets, and the staff was friendly and helpful, ensuring that the kids caught many fish. I think this activity is really good to train speed and reflexes, cos some of the fish are really fast and the nets are tiny. Well, it was great fun even for me, haha!

Of course, with the boat out of action for a while, I had the chance to visit THE PRIVATE POND again and tangled with freshwater species like Toman, Patin and Pink Tilapia.

Courtesy of Tim, my daughter pulls a Patin close to the shore

Here's the Patin, set for release

THE PRIVATE POND is a really nice place to spend time with the family fishing, and the bite rate is so good, even my small girl can catch fish. Thanks again to Sunny Tim and Bob.

Well, soon the boat was repaired and on its maiden voyage out of the repair docks, we started landing fish again. No time to update the stories yet, so here's a sneak preview... Phil gets his revenge on the Stingray he's always wanted to catch.

Since losing a big one a few trips back, Phil has always wanted to land a ray... Here he is with a 7.5kg ray, finally. Erwyn is laughing in the back... or crying?

In fact, Stingrays are gaining in popularity as a 'good catch' and even in supermarkets, they are beginning to fetch higher prices than farmed Barramundi. At about $6.99 a kilo, calculate how much Phil's ray would cost. What I do know is that Norman has been slowly enjoying his Sambal Stingray meals for the last few weeks after chopping up Phil's ray.

OK, will update further next time, soon.

10 Feb 2007 - guess what I caught today at the Cliff...

Kings, Jamie, Jeremy and PY joined me on a Big Fish Hunt today. I was only interested in biggies, just for kicks, and I had rigged up my line for the BIG ONE.

At the first spot, everyone was excited, and I rigged everyone's line the same way, and soon all lines baited and let down. The action started quickly, with a variety of small fish landed and put into the metal well. Then, just for fun, I took out my super light handline just to see if I could catch any of these small critters.

Immediately, I landed a big Croaker and a decent Snapper in quick succession. Then, on my third drop, POW! My thin line was being stripped through my palm, cutting into the flesh a little.

'BIG FISH!!!' I shouted, and everyone else brought in their lines to watch the fight. The irony was that my rod was rigged up for big fish, and I was fighting a monster on my super light handline!

The fight was long, as I had only my palms as drag. And I knew that if I pulled too hard, the line would snap easily. So I took in line inch my inch, and gave out line meter by meter, patiently waiting for the fish to tire. Then my line started becoming more horizontal, and I knew we were in for a great acrobatic display.

Suddenly, 20 meters behind the boat, everyone saw this huge silver Saltwater Barramundi head emerge from the water, and then the whole body erupted from the water in a huge explosion. A monster of a fish just leapt out of the water, with my tiny hook embedded in its mouth.

'Whoa! That's big man!' everyone seemed to echo in unison. Now we knew what we were up against. And the fish knew what it was up against too. So it took a dive, and plunged straight down into deep water, and that's when the line really started stripping from my fingers as my handline danced about on the floor of the boat. Then, for some added drama, I noticed something scary. There was a KNOT in my handline!!!

'Oh no!' I thought, as the knotted part of the line also made its way through my fingers and reached the waterline. That was the weakest part of my tackle. How did I miss that knot in the past? So now, I had to play it even safer, knowing that a single dead knot in the mainline could reduce the line's strength by more than 50%.

As lady luck would have it, the fish began to tire, and the knot became my gauge. I would pull in the line till the knot came into my hand, then the fish would pull the knot back into the water. This went on for about ten cycles, and then I got the knot in my hand without having to give it back.

With a tiring fish, I still had to be cautious as I slowly brought the fish to the surface, and it gave one last half-hearted jump, where my hook was NOT thrown (as in many previous instances) and I knew it was mine! When I guided the huge head into the landing net, Kingsley expertly plunged the net forward and lifted the fish into the boat.

'YEAH!' we cried, and high fives went around.

Then I tried to stand and my legs felt like jelly. This was an extremely exciting Barra fight simply because I was using an ultra-light handline and small hook... and the adrenaline rush really took its toll on my wobbly legs as I tried to remove the hook. Then I noticed that the hook had been crushed! And my line was loose. Can you imagine the strain that tiny hook had to go through, the powerful jaws of the Saltwater Barra... but it expired only after the job was done. The fish was safe on deck, and we took the customary pics.

I landed this beauty on ultra-light handline after a good fight. 7 kilos of Golden Muscle

After the euphoria, we caught some other fish, and shifted around Ubin and Tekong, where some table-sized fish were landed.

Jamie had a good fight and landed this hard fighting Grunter

Then we chilled out at some calm spots.

Here we are, chilling out at the front of the boat

Kings landed some nice stuff like another Snapper and a Red Snapper. And then Jeremy lost a huge fish that took line and managed to find a snag. I felt his line and could really feel a big fish struggling at the other end. Probably a big Garoupa, but despite all our efforts, the fish escaped.

We had quite a bit of bites, and our bait was down to the last few, when I cast my line into The Deep Channel. And almost immediately upon hitting the water, my rod went into a U and the drag was going out. And I could see a big silver silhouette in the water ahead of me. Another big fish?

Yes, the fish put up a good fight. And on normal days, I would have been really happy with this fish, but I had already landed a monster earlier, and this was the icing on the cake.

I landed this smaller one at 2.8 kg, a great fish in its own right

Looks like I had my hands full today... haha

We had great fun today. Added another big Barra to the collection, and added some table sized fish.

Here are some of the fish already packed in plastic... notice the lower jaw of my Barramundi creeping into the pic?

Jamie has even volunteered to be my deckhand till he enters NS in a few months' time. Well, maybe next Saturday I'll go for some other type of fish... I wonder...

3 Feb 2007 - a short exploration

... Had a cross country run this morning, so no boat fishing for me today, and now all my muscles are aching... and all that for 16th position. Shouldn't have bothered sprinting to the finish.

Anyway, by 1pm, I found myself free and so I brought the family out to some rural area in Singapore. While the kids were playing with all the other kids, I went on an exploration, remembering a long grass area down a slope with a small weed-covered pond.

Saw Tim fishing at the larger area, borrowed a rod from him, tied on a lure, and made my trek down the dirt path and down a slope towards the small secluded pond. I was wondering what this pond held.

I arrived at the small pond and was pleasantly surprised to see that someone had cut the grass

The place looked really quiet, and the wind was quite strong, so I scouted around the pond a little, to find a good place to cast my line without getting any weeds.

Here's another look at the pond, barely the size of a badminton court

Well, I saw some splashes in the water and hopefully cast my line. However, I was disappointed to find that the lure was not working well, and there was hardly any lure action on the nilsmaster spearhead, but when the lure reached beneath my feet, I stopped it in the water to let it float up, just in case a fish would snap at the bait when the lure stopped. How right I was!!! When the lure floated up, a small Haruan shot out from the weeds and struck my motionless lure, causing a splash right in front of me, and I promptly flipped the fish out of the water.

How's this for a small Haruan, only slightly larger than my 8 cm lure

I took the pic above then released the fish, hoping it would grow bigger. The lure wasn't working well, but I overcame that by twitching the rod tip every now and then. And the action picked up.

Had plenty of hits by small Haruan just like the first one, which mostly failed to register a solid hookup. But I started noticing that when I left the lure beneath my feet, some Haruan would hang around just below the water surface, eyeing the lure. I could have sworn I saw one particular Haruan staring at me directly, and when I stared back at it, it dived into the murky depths. So... I got my camera phone ready, and managed to snap a pic of the fish beneath my lure.

Notice the shadow of an Haruan on the right of my lure? Just beneath the water surface?

Anyway, I got back to serious fishing when my wife called and told me it was time to go, I had barely fished for half an hour! So I quickly made another cast, landed another baby Haruan, released it, and cast again.
This time, there was no mistaking the take of a more powerful fish! I saw a flash of Olive in the water and my little reel had its drag going. Beautiful sound man! The zagggg of the drag. Then the fish jumped! And I saw that it was an Haruan around the One Kilo mark... interesting... well, as they say, when there are babies...
OK, landed that fish after a fun acrobatic fight, snapped a pic of the trophy Haruan, and released the bugger to breed. (One kilo is about the max size of local Haruan I've caught so far.)

Here's the champion fish of the session, ready for release... notice the usual brown slipper

Released the bugger nicely, and started trekking back to civilisation. Well, this shows that our little ponds in the wilderness still contain some interesting fish.

(Note: Haruan is a different species of Snakehead from the Toman. The Haruan is more Olive and Brown in Colour, and don't normally grow as big as Toman.)

28 Jan 2007 quickie...

 After spending the morning with the family, and attending a friend's baby's 1 yr birthday party in the afternoon, I realized I had time for a little evening fishing. Kings smsed me at the same time I was thinking of fishing, and we decided to meet at the boat.

By 3.30pm, the boat was launched, and we headed into the strong winds towards Tekong, but curiosity got the better of me, and I decided to see if there were any stray reds left behind. So I hung around the Ubin area near green rock and to my surprise, the Reds were in a cooperative mood.

I quickly landed several Red Snapper in succession, even though I was quite far from the fish farms, and thought that I could fill up the ice box, but disaster struck, my anchor pulled, and we started drifting away from the rock.

We tried re-anchoring several times, but just could not get the boat to stay above the spot long enough to catch anything else, and the wind was getting stronger, so we headed to the Cliff to hide from the wind, caught some junk fish and big Duris, and Kings landed a Ribbon fish.

These two Red Snapper are quite healthy and right sized for eating... caught a few of these

Then we moved to Gap and almost immediately after casting one line into the snags, my rod went into a good bend, and the fight was on. Having lost many fish to the snags before, I knew the drag had to be dead tight, and I put full pressure on the fish, and the fish felt big, still managing to pull its way into the snags. Damn!

I thought it was a big Grouper, and took my time to coax the bugger out of the snags. I did some guitar string plucking on my line, let the line loose a little, and simply watched as the fish still struggled on the other end of the line. And finally, with one big tug, the fish came loose, and what I thought was a Grouper turned out to be a fat Grunter, well... not too bad I guess.

A surprising fat Grunter caught from the snags... I still would have preferred a big Grouper

Anyway, ran out of time after a super short fishing trip, and we did manage some nice quality fish for the ice box. Good excitement too. Verdict - the stray Red Snappers are still around, and have spread quite a distance away from their point of origin. I think there will always be a few left for anglers in 2007.

21 Jan 2007.... JIA LATT!!!

It seems like I'm playing more golf than fishing these days, but now that the tournament season is over, I'm back to fishing.

Heard from the boatel guys that a farm net full of Red Snapper burst at Ubin and some boats were having a field day at the expense of the poor fish farmers. It seems some boats were inconsiderate enough to tie up to the farms, and some anglers even cast their lines into the nets... sigh, is this what fishing in Singapore has degenerated to? No fish outside so catch from people's nets? That's stealing.

Anyway, I'm in no position to moralise cos I'm no saint myself, but my preference is still to enjoy a relaxing day at sea rather than anchor with so many boats around and get lines all entangled, and risk getting in trouble with the law too! (Heard the marine police were called in at one stage when some boaters got over-enthusiastic.)

I didn't do much fishing, as I said earlier, cos of golf, but I did manage a cruise on Felip's boat. We took a ride from Loyang to RSYC in the West Coast on the Ponga, not a bad ride, I must say. I'm seriously considering buying another boat now, so look out for my new diesel boat (so I can make day trips to Horsburg).

Anyway, I'm amazed at the smooth ride in rough seas we had yesterday, especially off the East Coast and off Sentosa, and we only used $30 of diesel... that's the selling point. Now I'm using about $200 of petrol just for a daytrip around Ubin. A difference of $170 is HUGE!!!! I wonder what colour I'll paint the new boat? (Still dreaming.. hahaha)

By the way, we passed the scene of the broken nets and saw only 2 boats anchored near the nets fishing... well, for some, I guess enough is never enough. And who knows, maybe I'll catch some stray remnant Reds on my next few trips. 10 000 fish is a whole lot of fish!

6 Jan 2007 - First major trip of the year...

with Norman and his family members, Philip (back for revenge over the monster), Iggy, Russ, Tim, Ian and Ash.

After meeting up at Changi Village and getting supplies from Gina, we went to the boat and immediately headed for a Guhood spot. (Since there were newbies onboard, I thought it would be fun to let everyone tangle with some fish, regardless of quality.)

When we reached the Grunter zone, things were a little quiet at first until I opened accounts with a shark.
"Shark?!!! Kewl!" came the comments from all the young anglers. I guess every new angler's dream is to catch a shark, and I remember the days when I kept on dreaming about catching sharks. Now, I was surprised that a junk fish like a shark drew so much admiration. So, to fuel their excitement, Iggy soon had a positive strike and fought up another shark.

"How cool is that man!? " exclaimed Iggy. He was obviously over the moon with his shark. The two sharks were kept alive and everyone had a fun time playing with the sharks in my metal touch pool at the back of the boat.

Of course, some proper fish came along eventually, like Grunters and Garoupas, but I soon noticed the sky turning dark, so I headed to Deep Valley, where I told Iggy they were going to catch an average of 10 fish per person (that's 80 fish for the whole boat!). Iggy couldn't believe it but when I landed 10 keepers in the first 20 minutes at Deep Valley, he knew I wasn't kidding.

Soon, with some guidance, everyone was landing fish, including the young Ash, everyone except our dear friend Philip, who only rigged up for monster fish with a gigantic hook (cos he lost a monster on his previous trip with me). For him, it was monster or nothing.

So, to please everyone, I shifted to the Monster Zone, where Philip and Norm got excited about the prospect of tangling with some big rays and Kuraus, but we only landed about 4 small to medium sized rays there (3 by Phil, 1 bigger one by me).

Norm and Phil waiting for their MONSTERS

Since it didn't rain, we moved to a Snagpile and caught some more stuff there, where Russ happily fought two strong Grunters to the boat. His day was also made.

At the final spot, just off the boatel, I landed an Ang Kor Li (Red Bream) which was beautiful to look at, and a Blue-spotted ray (for the touch-pool too).

Beautiful rainbow colours on this quite fat Bream for local waters

Finally, we ran out of bait and headed back around 4 pm. All of us were contented. The weather and company were excellent, and at least a few fish were cooperative.

Here's a part of the catch... we didn't bother to take the rest out of the ice