Thai fishing - April 2011

[jfishing]

Hi guys,
in April I had 2 amazing weeks of fishing. I have always loved the Thai style in their wonderful fishing parks. You're usually guaranteed to catch something good. It's so much easier than getting on a boat and searching the seas. These guys don't realise how lucky they are. I've been to this fishing park many many times and I always come away thrilled with the catches. Great food/drink, scorching weather and massive fish. These mekong catfish remind me of mini freshwater whale sharks.

Firstly, Bungsamran is still 1000 baht per rod and about 500 baht for bait. The 400 baht option is only open to expats who can prove residence in Thailand. An unfortunate rule and one that means I'll choose to fish elsewhere. I like a spot called Gnao Nam (150 baht per rod. I can fish 7 days for the price of 1 at Bung samran. It’s harder fishing but the average size of the fish seems to be bigger and the giants grow just as large.

Location: Gnao Nam: เงาน้ำ 13.74559 N, 100.37262 E

Bung samran: GPS Coord 13.79858 N, 100.66373E

For anyone who's not been before there are 3 common species that are caught in most Thai fishing parks:

1. Striped catfish (pla sawaii) They get up to about 25kg max although some have been caught at 44kg.

2. Mekong catfish (pla buek) They have been caught in the wild to 296kg and as high as 150kg in fishing parks. I once saw a 150kg species caught in the wild. Very impressive indeed.

3. Siamese carp (pla kahoe) They have been caught in fishing parks up to 120kg. Believed to top 300kg like the mekong catfish if they live long enough.

These 3 are mainly herbivores. The sawaii will eat prawns, small fish etc. Usually caught on bread. If you want predators then there are arapaima, chao phraya catfish and red tail catfish at other venues. Usually you have to pay more to catch these. At bung samran hooking an arapaima will cost you 15,000 baht (£306) if landed. The money is supposed to pay for the replacement of fish lost due to deep hooking and to reduce pressure on the species. There is now an amazon lake in Bangkok which is 500 baht a day but you can only use lures. I have only read about it. Never been so thats all I know. The mekong catfish pull hardest of all in my opinion so I'm happy with them. They tend to be the biggest fish around also.

When I fish I find the most productive method to be rice bran (called lam) with flavours added like vanilla and pandan. You can also try coconut, stawberry etc. It's up to you. This is mixed together with some water to form a powder that is pressed around a feeder. It has to be made right, like the texture of damp sand. This is so you can cast it and it will still break up in the water. Mekong catfish feed on plankton, weed and probably small invertibrates etc. Very small particles are what you want. They do also have a liking for bread. Pretty much all Thai fish do. So most days I arrived at 4pm, fishing for 12 or more hours. It’s cooler and the fish seem to bite more at night but be warned the mosquitos are brutal. In the day you get hounded by flies anyway so what can you do? It’s also incredibly humid fishing by water. True its nicer in the day time but sometimes you have to let the fish dictate when you go.

I like to fish at Gnao nam. I pay 3 pounds per rod (150 baht). Bags of lam are 25 baht each. I'd typically start with 10 bags and buy more at the later end of the session. This is mixed up in a huge plastic bowl. (A guide can do it for you.) Like one used to wash clothes in. The food is great here. Everything is a reasonable price. The only problem is knowbody speaks much English. I have my Thai sweetheart to translate. Anyone going there may need a Thai speaking friend or a phrase book. It's only fishing after all. Pay for your rods. Buy your bait. Give a few little tips when you can. They are very nice and helpful people.

All hooks, line, floats and bait can be bought on site but local tackle shops will be a bit cheaper. Usually I buy all my gear in a tackle shop and buy emergency supplies on site as needed. Bait must be bought on site but flavours, coconut milk etc can be taken in. Bread also seems a great option but it tends to catch more stripped catfish than mekong catfish when fished with a float below the surface. Lam is usually fished about 2 metres below the surface. I use a size 1 hook and a 3 to 4 inch braid hook length. The carp are not as plentiful as the other species but if you want to catch them you have to fish on the bottom, with either lam or bread. I'd say 80% of the time you'll hook a stripped catfish or a mekong catfish. Usually the first one. With lam on the bottom the hook isn’t baited so it must be popped up with foam. The idea is for the fish to suck in the hook while they take in the particles of lam.

Another popular method is a kind of kneaded bread with coconut milk and sugar. It is fished like dough on a hook. The dough is squeezed around the hook. This hook has small foam balls pressed onto it to make it buoyant. This can be cast 15 yards or more out. A handful of marble sized pieces of dough are then thrown around the hook to bring the fish in. Hopefully one picks up the hook and you are away. You have to watch your rod and strike quickly. It doesn’t seem as productive as lam but I have seen some of the biggest fish caught this way. One reason for this might be that

1. yes bread is a very good bait.
2. A bag of kneaded bread only costs 100 baht and will last for hours. So it’s very cheap. I tried it a couple of times, always hopeful for a carp. It wasn’t to be. From what I’m told this is one thing Bungsamran is better for, Carp. When talking with an expat he said the carp at Bungsamran are extremely skittish. You have to cast you bait near the platforms of the bungalows but you can’t make a sound for fear of spooking them. You can find more about fishing methods throughout the web.

So in my 2 weeks of fishing I must have fished for over 100 hours. I usually got 5 or more fish a session. Some monsters. All fought very hard indeed. One thing I find is that the biggest fish fight the slowest. They just swim around like they don’t know they are hooked or they don’t care. I’ve never caught sharks but from videos I’ve seen I think a big Mekong catfish must be like hooking a small bull shark. They just pull and pull. They never get tired. They’d often get brought right to the platform (not easily of course) and then proceed to swim out 150 yards again.

My most exciting catch was a 20kg stripped catfish. I really thought I’d hooked a carp but then it woke up. It must have thought it was born a tuna because it started going ballistic up and down the lake. It was bending a 500g jigging rod rated for 18kgs of drag almost in half. Another thing to mention is tackle. I caught a big Mekong catfish on my Daiwa bait runner (4550 BRT)(the barrel shapped fat fish). The drag was fully locked down. After 20 mins of going where it wanted I finally got it to turn. Another 15 minutes got it landed. I could feel the reel bending in my hands. You can catch fish on UK tackle but it’ll soon burn out and it may fail. The abu 6500 is capable of catching all fish I encountered but it’s hard work. A longer handle would be better. A 7000 size reel is better suited.

My best performing reel was an Ajiking pro jigger (clone of Avet sx) . It made fishing good but challenging. I used either 50lb mono or 65lb braid. Mono is better because it sinks so you don’t get tangled with fellow fisherman on either side of you. Braid floats and drifts across the lake and across other peoples swims. Space is a premium on these fishing parks. When these fish want to go there aren’t many reels that can stop them dead. Except maybe Accurates, Jigging masters etc. Make sure you have 200 yards of line for that matter. You will still have to chase fish down the bank when they are giants.

I like to use short jigging rods (5ft to 6ft, 250g to 450g) but a 30lb class rod should be fine. These fish are giants. The leverage of pulling in a 100lb fish on a 5 foot jigging rod is much easier than a 7, 8 or 9 foot uptider. Many UK fishermen like to use heavy catfish rods like those for wels. It's great for casting but not easy pulling them in. The lakes are largely free of snags in the water so you don't need to worry about keeping lines high. Anyway this was some of the best fishing of my life.

I can only think GTs, amberjacks, tuna, marlin etc would be better but it wouldn’t be as economical. Here’s 3 of my best. If you ever get the chance to go, make sure you do. I'd love to be a fishing guide out here if i thought I could get enough customers. Then again, if only England had this fishing!!!

Tight lines, -Jack



and a few more....



Here are some I caught on previous trips:

[jfishing]

These were caught in Phuket.





A whopper at a Singapore aquarium