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Taiwan Ngor at Sembawang Park: Our Very First Inflatable Self Boating Fishing Trip

This was the beginning... the beginning of a new golden era of self boating trips. This was where legends cement themselves on the muddy ground. This was where a small piece of prawn meat could launch a thousand belukangs (catfish). This was where we were bled... 

This was our very first fishing trip on a cute inflatable boat!

Fishing is getting tougher all the time in Singapore and when Boatman Shawn invested in his inflatable boat fleet, things were always going to get interesting although understandably noone wanted to do any investing except while Boatman Shawn himself. We knew we were going to be in for some wacky and extreme fishing (a fishing shoutout now made popular by Robson Green)!

And so, it happened... armed with some live prawns, live milkfish and two oars... We paddled on our ridiculously long banana shaped inflatable boat to our fishing spot! Some broken down jetty which we knew would hold some fishes was our top fishing spot (It was later on proven on another trip that this was a good spot for Chermin!)

Paddling an inflatable was always going to be more difficult than a kayak as it has less tracking. As we battled the wind and current, we were probably half regretting coming out in the middle of the night to torture ourselves with some arm roasting.

The strategy used in this spot of 5m of sand dunes and various debris which was flanked by broken jetty pillars was simple. A single hook tied to the leader with a small splitshot to weigh the live milkfish down. The live milk fish was cast against the current and allowed to free swim. The strategy provoked an instant response and Weiyee got his mainline snapped by a big pull in less than 5 minutes! This got our blood hot and everyone was in their deadly killer assasin mode... well except me I guess!

The look of killers...


Weiyee let another milk fish down and it was just a split second before something big took the bait and Weiyee's reel was screaming! We were all thinking KBL (Barramundi) here as the fish gave strong bursts and took us for a ride. We were all waiting for it to jump but it never jumped at all during the whole fight. We were spinning in our boat while the fish fought ... till we saw a glimpse of silver as the fin breached the water surface... My first thoughts were Jewfish?!??!?!

The thought of the famous Jewfish on the end of the line was a bummer! Weiyee passed the rod to me as the fish went under my side of the boat and I battled the fish with minimal drag now as we were not sure how badly damaged the lines were since abrasion may have taken place. I slowly coaxed the fish near to the boat and adjusted the rod angle to accommodate any strong bursts under the boat...

Till it was finally... into the net... and we then got a huge shock... A wild Red Drum aka Taiwan Ngor was thrashing in the net. This fish was much more rarer than the Kbl and although there were reports here and there that the Red Drum existed in our waters, I didn't really research extensively into these.... but now... the Red Drum is more of a pond fish in Singapore with various payponds stocking their pond with these dirty fighters. The red drum we saw now might have escaped from fish farms to now call our waters it's own. The fish was not an escapee so it must have been offspring from an escapee or perhaps it has been naturalised after a long time in the wild! Beautiful red hues and a prominent spot on the tail. It was even confirmed later on that the fish had roe in its belly!

A good photo with Weiyee in Happy Style


The beautiful Red Drum...

And after a few photos, we were on our way back to our launch point as the tide made it unsuitable to fish because of the downgoing tide pushing murky water to the spot... But it was a good outing and boatman Shawn's very first Red Drum spot... hehehe....

Comments

Hedonist said…
that is quite an adventure and a great catch from ur killer fren !
Hedonist said…
that is quite an adventure and a great catch from ur killer fren !
h|d|R said…
Bro, how much dia boatman shawn invest in the kayak. Whats the brand btw?
Nigel said…
hi bro boatman shawn invested i think probably 3 - 4 k in all including all the basic safety items. its not a kayak but an inflatable boat by kairos
FusionStream said…
It's termed a kaboat.

Which is a cross between a kayak and a boat. This Kairos (singapore) model is a clone of the popular-in-the-states Saturn line of kaboats (specifically the sk430).

There are some improvements and drawbacks to this local clone.

The boat cost around 1.5K.
To put a motor, you need to register the boat and registration requires a shitload of additional items.

To be detailed at singaporefishing.org

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