Bream

Felt a little sick today, and weather wasn't that great. Got flu virus going around, and my body was resisting to fall sick. Bones were aching a little and generally, didn't feel great. It was drizzling in Woodlands, but I packed my stuff just in case. Only thing that I did not bring was the icebox. I half suspected that the weather in the East should be better, if not raining. True enough, by the time I drove to CV, the rain was very slight. I got some prawn meat from Riverland and drove down to Secret place, hoping that the gate would be open.

And indeed, to my pleasant surprise, it was. So happily, I zipped right in and in no time, was at my favourite corner by the canel. However, a lone man was there occupying the corner. While I was setting up, he got something, but I couldn't make it out from my angle.

Since it was still drizzling, I only setup a single rod. The rain was very slight, and from the clouds, I didn't think that it would last very long. This time round, I wanted to experiment a little and didn't want to use small hooks. I would have gotten lots of small fishes with small hooks for sure, but I wanted to target something bigger.





There were lots of bites, but due to my big hooks (size 4), I couldn't get any hookup. I was sure that if I really wanted, it would not be a problem to get at least a dozen or so pasir pasir or emperors. Lots of them here. I was only lucky one time and managed to get something of decent size. (200-300g). It was a bream. Gotten in Kelong before, but first time in Singapore waters. I was already quite satisfied with the catch. Since I didn't have an icebox, I released the fellow. Thereafter, nothing much and I packed around 6pm and moved out of the place. Kind of worried that the gate would be closed. But it was still wide opened and there wasn't any problem getting out.

After coming out, driving down the road, it started to rain. Hm, I had been lucky that the secret place was kind of the only place that wasn't raining. Well, not too bad that I still had the chance to fish a little this weekend.

Crabby Day

I had wanted to try ponggol again today, but the weather was rather hot. I only just recovered from the previous sun burn and didn't want to get myself chow tar again. It had been awhile since the last secret spot trip, and today seemed like a good time.

Unfortunately, driving up to the gate, it was blocked with a "no entry" sign displayed prominently. Gate was also closed. Haiz. Not sure if this was just temporary, else another good spot gone. I drove up to tanah merah canel and found that there was a small space to park the car. Happily, I turned right into the canel amidst all the construction. But just as I was taking out my rod, a small lorry came over and horned at me. The man in the car signalled about a no parking and no fishing combo. He kept an eagle eye until I packed everything and drove out of that place.

Next, I tried Safra resort. Luckily, the single lot there was unoccupied. I shared the space with another car belonging to the malay family around there. They seemed to have camped overnight here evident from the extensive tentage and number of rods around the area. Few more people came over to fish and the place was really getting quite crowded.

I rigged up and managed to score a little fish within the minute. Unfortunately, it was a puffer. I was to pull up another 2. They were quite irritating as their strong beak would destroy the rig if they swallowed the hook deeply. I had to change one of the rig due to this.



The tide by then was dropping and my lemax rod with big hooks and prawn got no action. I lost one live prawn one time and I hooked up a dead prawn to replace that hook. I thought due to that, a crab came to steal the bait. Seeing the rod tip dipping, I gave a yank and pull it in. At first, it felt like a rubbish bag as there was no fight. But I was pleasantly surprised to see quite a decent size crab out of the water. It tried to right itself on the land to run off but I managed to subdue it and flipped it over again. A came over and got some strings to tie its powerful claws. A chinese guy came over to help us to tie it up. He seemed to know a thing or two, teaching us how to "deactivate" the claws and the proper way of tying it up.



Around 2+pm, there was totally no action even on my small rod. Tide had went down and all the fishes had gone. I packed up to go. Quite an uninspiring fishing day, but then again, at least got a decent crab meal tonight.

OT: Cat

Nope, not a fish. Nothing to do with fishing...but this is the cat below my house. Friendly bugger and would always "meow" when you talk to it. Desiree and I quite like this one out of the whole clan of roaming cats around here. But it had recently been adopted by someone on the 2nd floor and I had not been seeing it often.

Ponggol Jetty

I had originally wanted to head for Ponggol 17th but the way in was blocked by 2 giant stones. Only a very narrow car or a bike could get in now. Andrew had suggested that the jetty was quite a good place. The jetty was nearby so I made a turn and ended up there instead.



The jetty looked nice having had some upgrading work being done here. I had fished here about a year ago but at that time, I was very inexperienced and only came here for luring. The water looked ok, although quite cloudy as it was near to some shipyard. I setup my long rod and concentrated on targetting for some bigger fishes. But some of the areas were quite snaggy. My guess was corals or rocks in a certain direction. Due to the squeeze with the people fishing at the jetty, I could only cast a certain angle. All I got for the effort was a crab that was stealing my bait. A boat was also coming and going to pick people up for outward bounds school. After losing 3 rigs, I gave up and setup my light tackle for smaller fishes.



There was a father and son team who were doing quite well. Son got a selar as well as a small ACK. I joined in the jigging fishing and did manage to feel quite a lot of bites. Hm, there was a good population of bait fishes down there. However, due to my cluminess, I was losing my bait pretty fast. But after some practise, I got the hang of it and did manage my first fish here, a goby. Then followed by a cardinal (hm, getting alot of this this year). Luck turned better and I pulled up a good size silver biddy (wah bee). After another 5 minutes, another wah bee. This one was quite big that when it took the bait, I almost dropped the rod. Then another stroke of luck and I got a pretty big selar. Imagine getting a selar in Singapore waters. That was my first.

Andrew came over to look see and let him do some fishing with my remaining bait. But my rod was quite hard to tame as it was quite soft, hence setting hooks wasn't easy. The water began subsiding and I called it a day as the plan was to hard for the bottle tree park for a look see. By then, I was already very sun baked and turning a chilli red having been under the sun for about 3 hours. Due to the strong wind, it didn't feel hot but the UV was actually quite intense. Even D and A were turning red under the shade.



Not too bad a catch today. This place was certainly quite fruitful for small fishes.

1st Fishing 2007

TC said to try SAF Yacht club again at changi. Having just bought some new gear, he wanted to wet his stuff. The last experience there wasn't too good, with me landing 2 cats only. However, I thought the place was quite fishable and the the fishing was bad due to wrong timing and such.

We met at CV to buy bait and then were at the club around 10pm. Jetty was surprisingly packed again, and we only got space at the starting stretch of the jetty near to land. This time round, a man came around and started collecting money for the fishing. I wasn't spared even though I was guest of TC, he being a member here. So much for the free fishing. But man was very friendly and gave us pointers on where and when to fish. According to him, now was the season for trevally and there had been some catches of zhaomeng and chaoxi recently. He also told me to fish around the rocks as it was a good spot for KBL. That was music to my ears and getting one here today would be very good indeed.

I rigged up 3 rods, 1 L&F 9 footer, 1 Lemax and 1 Light tackle. Water was calm but I only had rigs for LSBF (meant for strong current), but no matter I rigged up live prawns and shot out the lines. The light tackle, I used dead prawn meat and fished around the rocky areas near the shore.

The rest of the rods were very quiet. There was a false alarm when my 9 footer apparently caught something strong. But after some pulling, I saw the light stick floating in the air. Darn, line was crossed with the anglers outside the club. From mine and their throwing angle, we would met at 90 degrees some 100 metres away. Someone later also thot he got a biggie as the line was peeling off his spool quite fast. But again, it was another cross line with the opposite angler. Turned out that only my light tackle had any action.









Around 12am, little bites came and I pulled up my first fish, a small cardinal. Snap snap, some pics and I let it go. A little while later, another cardinal. And then, my first reasonable catch for the year, a reddish big eyed fish (red soldier fish). Then followed by a better catch of my biggest grouper yet (slighty bigger than my hands), a tiger (flowery) grouper. All the fishes were kind of small and I released all of them.

TC was not getting anything and was feeling frustrated and started grumbling about going back to kelong again. Some bites here and there and spent a bit of time battling with the snags and some problems with his lines. The area at the front was very snaggy and I myself lost 3 rigs. But the fishes seemed to be there. Casting anywhere else was not productive. After the grouper catch, action all died down. Someone came over and said a KBL was caught and then later, an ACK. Hm, but that was further down the jetty, the deeper end.

We stayed till quite late, around 3am and then called it a day. Good thing about this place was that the toilet was very clean and hotel standard, and came in handy as I had a sudden stomach ache from the CV food.

Score for 2007

Total Score for 2007:
Fresh on Lure:
Toman - 2
PB - 3
...
Salty:
ACK - 4
Barracuda - Lots small, 1 medium, 1 big.
Bream - 2
Cardinal - 4
Catfish -1
Common Silver Biddy, Slender Mojarra - 4
Cobia - 1
Crab - 1
Croakers - 2
Cuttle fish - 1
Emperor - Lots
Goby Fish - 1
Groupers - 1 good size, lots of small ones
Grunter - 2, 1 2kg
Honey Head Damsel - 1
Half beaks - lots
KBL - 1
Mackerals - some
Pasir Parsir - Few
Puffer - 2
Queenfish - 1
Rabbit Fish - Few
Remora - 1
Seagrass Tuskfish - 1
Selar/Kembong/Kuning/Mackerals - Lots
Silver Biddy - 1
Soldier fish - 1
Sotong - lots, 2 big ones
Spanish Flag Snapper - 1
Stingray - 1
Sweetlips (Kaci) - 3
Tambans - countless
Todaks - lots
Wrasse - lots
Wolf herrings (Parang fish) - 8
Yellow Tail - Lots

Salty on LURE:
2 tambans on metallic sardine
18 small barracudas
1 1+ feet barra
6 Wolf herrings
1 Kekek
1 2.8 kg barra
1 ribbon fish