Kelong Limat Once Again

First time for him to go under the Tuas custom bridge


Hey, a new Kelong here


Patrick happened to be free today and we decided to pay a visit to the Tuas Kelong as he hadn't been there before. To my surprise when I called to book it, I was informed that it was empty. It used to be rather crowded as there was a group that frequent there every weekend. Previously, the catch rate here was pretty impressive, and there were some photos of some past catches of big fishes.

I mis-stepped and almost fell into this hole. Unluckily my arm hit the wooden pole and stablised me


Nobody here


When we arrived there, indeed it was. The fishing was very relaxing given that we had the kelong to ourselves. However, the fishes weren't there. Even getting Tamban was a rather difficult affair. I tried to do some luring and did manage to get some bites from the todaks but couldn't get a firm hookup. As Todaks here was rather small and hence, the hookup wasn't easy.



Yay! Her first todak


Time slowed down


She got another one




Seeing not much action, I decided to throw out some glass fishes for todak fun. I let D have a go at handling the fish herself and landing it. She managed to get 2 of them, all by herself.

Good pic to make into jigsaw puzzle


Moon came out


Dog int the dog house


Leaving the Kelong


However, that was about it for the fishing here. No encounters with any other biggies. Even using bait on tamban jigs was not easy although Patrick's wife did get some wrasse and small leatherjacket. We packed around 5.30pm and got the boatman to bring us back.

Although not much in terms of fishing, it was a relaxing outing. We had a good dinner at the famous Tien Lai restaurant before heading back to JB town for some shopping and then back home.

Patrick checking on his pics


We couldn't even fill up this tiny icebox


Reaching the Jetty

KFC - Hot Boys Kelong Fishing

We arrived at Sibu rather early, after meeting up and having breakfast at the usual haunt of Mac near Carrefour. Going via the Sedili route, the going was rather speedy despite having to navigate over some bomb craters on the otherwise nice-to-drive road. Within 1.5 hours, we reached the Jetty. We would have been earlier if not for the detour fo find the fishing pond for live prawns. We saw a huge sign, but asking the locals, none of them knew where the pond was. :(

We exceeded the limit. There were 15 of us on board. :)

At the Jetty, we had to wait a little for the other group that was a little bit late. We were pleasantly surprised to find out that there were only the 6 other people in the kelong. That makes a total of 17 pax for the trip and the fishing was very relaxing indeed. Probably due to the exam period and also the fear of fishing during the ghosty month. Also, the malay folks were fasting, so fishing was too exerting for them. :)

Only 2 tables for meals
f

Therefore, we almost had the whole kelong to ourselves. I had not been to Hot Boys for the longest time. In fact, in all my trips to kelongs in Sibu, this would be only the 3rd time that I would have set foot here. Although the beds were not that clean, generally they were quite comparable with the other 3 kelongs. The main reason for me not going is the advertised price on their website which was rather steep compared to the other 3.

fThe 3 rascals that bullied my little cherrywood!

Double hookup of 3 in a row of Snooks

Got a basket of these

We had the cook prepared it for dinner

The other group, were just doing recreational type of fishing. so there weren't any long rods around to impede casting in any direction. Unfortunately, the bait fishes today weren't too cooperative and it was rather difficult to get bait fishes to throw out for live baiting. We hit on a school of baby barras and we kept getting them enough to fill up a basket. We decided to have the cook prepare it for us for our dinner. Occasionally, we would also hit on some big selars which ready put up a good fish. Once, I had 3 of them on the same line and my cherrywood rod was bent to the max.:O

The food for this trip was rather good, I should say. For lunch, we had a table sized chermin. For dinner, we had steamboat. For the lunch the next day, we had 3 pieces of Kurau. With the good eating fare, we were rather worried that the trip would indeed cost us. :S

Ros's first todak

For the day fishing, due to the limited live baits, I didn't manage to help KT get his first todak. With one of the lucky live bait, Ros managed to land one under my guidance. Andrew was getting them with dead prawn meat which worked quite effectively. Except that those that came up were rather small. But it was better than nothing and KT had a few go at it. However, all the strikes thrown the hook when they thrashed and leaped out of the water. That impressed KT quite a bit having tasted the powerful of the acrobats of the sea. Still, none was landed for him.

Jetty to Sibu Island

A Beetle came a visiting KT's hat to give a dose of good luck

They certainly had fun

Hmm...hot boys?

We were relaxing one corner. All missing is bacardi and rum and maybe some bikini girls to give us backrubs :P

That afternoon, the children said that they wanted to go to the Sibu island. Seeing that Dezi and Ely hadn't been there, we decided to make a trip. Andrew, KT and I took our luring rods there thinking to try out some luring. But the island wasn't too suitable for luring and we just sat there relaxing instead while the children had fun burying each other in sand. On the way back, while waiting for the boat, we did some luring at the jetty. There was some activity and a few times, we see splashes and some reaction on the lures. But we didn't have enough time and had to stop when the boat arrived.

Pat looked like an escape convict

It rained for half hour for so around 6. But nothing serious. It was back to fishing after the rain stopped.

Hoho! The green squid jig was a killer

Eric is now on a squidding row

Night came and we went on to do some squidding. Eric had with him a new green squid jig which worked very well. He was first to haul up a very good size squid around 6+pm, when it wasn't even dark yet. KT got excited and tried it out himself and was rewarded with one. There after, he was grinning to himself the whole night (Ha! Say me some more).

Nice evening. Hungry ghosts coming out

Elyn admiring the sunset

I set off to test the water for parangs as it was the intention to help Pat and KT land their very first. Indeed they were around, but not alot. I got a number of strikes but didn't manage to connect. My lumi SS minnow wasn't working well. That I reviewed logically that it was due to the rather tall height that we were from the water. For some reasons, the water level this trip was rather low. SS minnow was a super shallow runner and with too steep an angle from the lurer, it couldn't run well. So I changed to my standard L-minnow and that was better.

KT's first squid! See how wide the grin

KT helping to land Eric's fiesty parang

One for the album

Dal also had a squid (again on the green thing)

Eric was on a roll this trip and got 4 parangs in a space of a short time which impressed the parang newbies of Pat and KT. KT was trying out with his x-rap at one corner when I passed him and asked him to try for parangs. But he told me that he had gotten a todak and was in the midst of fighting it. I was shocked and stood around to see his todak. As he was reeling in, the fish at the other end decided to take a leap. That moment, I saw that it was a parang instead. Not bad at all. But parang swam too close to the stilts and the line got entangled with it. Then parang was lost thereafter. After that, he went on to use his other lures which I think wasn't quite suitable.

After so many misses, finally a good size one

Elyn was fishing the whole night till late

Andrew was too tired from the trip and knocked out quite early. Therefore, not much action from him during the night. That night, I only managed to land 1 parang. Elyn was sleeping mostly in the day and fished till rather late at night. She managed to get some interesting variety of fishes that I seldom seen. I too was rather tired and went to sleep. But the bed was rather warm and I sneaked off to sleep at the karaOke room on the sofa. It was rather comfy and I really slept tight till the alarm woke me at 5am. I heard that there was a 2hr manhunt for me when they saw that I was not on my bed and might had fallen into the water fighting off a 15kg barracuda. :D

Early morning luring, and a small consolation catch

That morning at 5am, the parangs were more cooperative and I hit 3 parangs and lost quite a number. Pat and KT too joined me. But alas, Pat was using the SS minnow too and I didn't realise till it was rather late. I passed him an L-minnow. But for some reasons, he had no bites at all. It might be due to the strong current and his weights were not enough. Once the morning arrived, the parangs would be gone.

Hmm..this should qualify for the Guiness book of record!

Elyn got a fierce fighter of a Leatherjacket

Alien looking fish

Fresh catches from the sea

Again, the bait fishes were hard to get that morning. But very interestingly, Andrew and I saw a big cobia circling around the kelong. We tried hard to target it. But there wasn't any live bait and we settled for a dead one. We saw the cobia coming near to the bait and took a sniff at it and turn away. Andrew and I were holding our breaths when that happened. What a waste! If that had been a live bait, we should have a good fight with it. We tried couple of times until time ran out and we had to pack.

Although the fishing wasn't spectacular, it was relaxing indeed. It was also nice to see big fishes circling round the kelong. It was such a pity about the poor availability of bait fishes. But parangs and squid were also there to entertain us for the trip. All in all, a rather good kelong family fishing trip. Definitely a relaxing one :))

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KFC - Tampines Quarry

We went Tampines Quarry this morning. I think this is not an illegal spot. Well, I don't see any no fishing sign here. In fact, there were plenty of rubbish and litter on the floor that indicated that there were lots of fishing activities here. We cast for a while and caught nothing. This place was a far cry from most of the shh spots that we go to. But there were occasional splashes from some big monsters in the water. Some quite near to us.

The char bee hoon fly


Tiny 4-5 cm fingerling. Got foul hooked on the body


I was trying out the char-bee-hoon fly and got the smallest fish ever in my life on artificial. It was a tiny PB fingerling. Probably only about 4-5 cm. But it was foul hooked on the body. I quickly took out the hook w/o any pics. I had wanted to catch a small PB to put into my tank. But this fellow didn't seem to be in good health after having the hook impale the middle of its body. But it was still alive as I put it into a plastic bag.

My 2nd PB. A more respectable catch


Tapao for my aquarium


My second fish on the char-bee-hoon fly was a more respectable small PB. It gave a good fight as I guided it in to avoid the many branches. Fish was nicely hooked on the lips. With my debarbed hooks, it was removed easily. I quickly find a bigger plastic bag from the trash around and have it nicely bagged/tapao for my aquarium. The other tiny one, I released hoping that it would recover.

Uncle stood behind me doing nothing for 15 mins until I moved to another spot. Must be I took his favourite spot


Pat and KT got nothing on both sides of me. After a while, some people came with bicycles to do baiting. Seeing what they were carrying, they were fully equipped to target the bigger monsters here. One uncle waited at my spot until I moved away. Probably his favourite bottom spot. Quite cool. His bicycle is a modified rod stand.

Here no fish, but plenty of rubbish :(
Please, if you fish, take care not to litter the area.

KFC - Why Legal Fishing Spots has no fish

We discovered a spot lately that was very productive. The last time we went, we were quite late and there was already a crowd fishing at the corner. Not wanting to crash the party, we did some fishing along the banks and only managed to hit one small fish. KT almost lost his vibe but was lucky again to save it back.

This morning, I brought Pat back to the same spot. But this time, despite all the difficult-to-walk terrain, we braved the muddy ground and trod along to reach the river mouth. Already at 6.40am on a Thursday morning, there were around 4 or 5 or so chinese foreign workers with 1 or 2 locals fishing there. Mind you, they were not only using little bait fishes, but were also on feathers and lures. Quite sophiscated this bunch. Squeezing ourselves on a narrow side, we did our casting.

Pat has reached the place earlier on while I was assembling my gear. When I joined him, he already got a big momma PB. The area here was simply amazing. There was water movement all over. At some places, it was almost boiling from all the feeding frenzy. The group beside us was on a roll. They were pulling up PBs every minute. Looking around, I saw that they were certainly not the Catch & Release type and the fishes were meant to be "tapaoed" back. From my estimate, there were already like 20+ PBs in 2 keepnets. Overhearing their conversation, they had gotten 70+ the day before. I wouldn't be surprised if they were here everyday and catching them at this rate. With some mental calculations, this would work out to about 2000 odd PBs per month. Can they really eat all that?

I can understand that they might want it for food as eating in Singapore is not cheap, and what more to have live fish for food. But shoudn't there be a limit of what they can eat? The bagging limit in this case would probably be how much they can carry back before giving up. There was no other word for it. The PBs here were simply waiting to be massacred.

That morning, my fly wasn't tied quite well and didn't swim naturally. Due to that, I only had 2 hits. Pat had 3 hits and some escaped ones. But given the crowded location, I wasn't quite in the mood to fish that much. It was just an eye opening to see how greedy people can get. When we toss the PB back to the water, one chap even got the cheek to chide us for putting it back into the same fishing area saying that it would spook all the other fishes away.

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KFC - Hit By Double Silver Bullets

Waking up early this morning, Pat and I visited the famous river. Getting there was not so easy, but after some monkey swings and leopard crawls, we arrived at the location in the dark. Setting up our gear was getting quite challenging but after some fumblings with our touchlights, we managed to start our first cast before the sun comes up.

But after 10 cast or so, nothing was biting yet. I was at the rocky area doing when Pat suddenly came behind me like a ghost and showed me his first big catch of a PB. It was his biggest so far. Strange that I didn't hear any splashes but he said it was so noisy. Hmm, the sound might have been blocked by the big tree in between us.

For me, nothing was biting my furry friend and I was starting to wonder about this location when something swooped up and hit the fly with a mighty force. My braided lines were peeling off and when the fish got close, it was another surprise of a Sebarau. Woot woot. This is my 2nd in such a short time. And bigger this time. Again congratulary rounds of photo takings for the sweet memories and then Sebarau went back home.

Pat went further up the river and missed a strong take. I saw him bending back to form a nice arc with his rod. I was about to take out my camera to video it when the fish was lost. From the initial fight, it was definitely a prize one. Too bad.

Next fish for me was a PB. Although not big, this fellow was in the prime of health and gave me a thumping good fight. After that, things started to quieten down after that. This morning, the river was rather still and the water not flowing. That might have affected the catch rate.

Times was almost up when my final few cast got on to a solid take again. This time, my reel again sung as the lines peeled out. It was noticably longer and the fish fought harder. Fish went left and right. When it surfaced, I was elated to see another silvery bullet. This one was the biggest and a beautiful specimen with a clear black mark cover the silvery scales. I tire it out and then it was hoisted to the grassy ground for photo taking. My biggest ever.

Although not very high catch rate here today, but the quality of the catch was remarkable. Good morning exercise for me and Pat. After that, it was to the SHH coffee shop. Indeed the aroma of the coffee there is better. AFter a decent breakfast and chit chat about the fruitful morning, we went home after a beautiful start to the day.

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