Semporna Offshore Fishing

Semporna Offshore fishing can be quite productive if you charter the better boat. Inferior boat charter usually fish close to shore which has been over-fished and you end up with small fish in shallow water. Here is the trip report for my recent Semporna fishing trip.

We flew to Tawau and took a MPV to Semporna. The hotel is just by the jetty and is surrounded by many eateries.  

 

Kyoto Fishing Tackle Shops

Kitagawa fishing tackle shop

Kitagawa fishing tackle shop is location in Kyoto and is often visited by local Japanese because they can get very good deals there. The shop is big and the goods are stacked up to the ceiling, you will need to use a pole with a grip or ladder to reach the items that the top. I bought quite a number of off-season lures there and they even have catch report of the lures to show that those lures works. Although they can process tourist tax rebate there, they do charge a small admin fee for it. 

Address : 19 Chudoji Mibukawacho, Shimogyo Ward, Kyoto, 600-8806, Japan

Fishing Eight Kyoto Fushimi

This is the largest fishing tackle shop in Kyoto with 3 floors of fishing goodies! The best thing is that they actually have signs saying photo and video taking are OKAY. I bought a 2021 Daiwa reel which is marked 50% off retail and when you take into account the exchange rate and tax rebate, it is a steal! Another tourist and I lamented that we should have bought a bigger luggage because there was just so much to buy. One thing I would bring next time is an empty rod tube because the 1-piece rod are crazy affordable, and they have seasonal deals, like this is Tailwalk month and all Tailwalk product have an additional 20% off on top of the off-season reduced price.

Fishing Max, Kyoto Sanjo Teramachi

This shop is located on the 2nd floor in the heart of the shopping district. You can pop by after eating the delicious food around the area. This shop is smaller than it counter part in Osaka but some special deals in the shop.

Malaysia Rompin & Tioman Fishing Guide

I created some slides and decided to convert it to a video. I have people asking the same old questions and so doing this is more a more efficient use of my time. For any other questions, I shall address them in another video.

Below are some of the suggest tackle from the video.

SAILFISH

Live Baiting

• Tackle –
• 5-6ft PE4-6 boat rod
• Reel that can set 10kg drag (line must withstand, duh)
• Line capacity of at least 250m 
• Spinning set up is preferred
• Rig – 
• 60lb leader or more
• Circle Hooks of Mustad Size 6/0 – 8/0 equivalent.
• Ask the crew for preference
• Others method such as popping, luring, flyfishing, you probably have your preference and you can get expert advise elsewhere. 

SQUID

Squid Jig

• Tackle – 
• 6ft light rod (PE0.5-1.5)
• Reel to match the rod (Shimano 2000-2500)
• Set minimal drag to bring the squid to the surface
• Rig – 
• Squid jig #2.5/#3 with additional weight 
• Paternoster rig with squid jig.
• Do not bring your 8ft eging rod to the boat, you don’t need to cast far and the soft rod cannot work well with the additional weight.

BOTTOM FISH

Baiting

• Tackle
• Rod – PE4-6 boat rod that can handle >250g sinker comfortably. 
• Reel – Drag capable of more than 5kg else you need to thumb.
• Rig  
• Paternoster rig with 60lb leader. Just one branch is enough.
• Daiichi DX SOI #20/#22 J hook or equivalent size. 
• Bait  
• Live fish or squid strips are preferred. 
• “Butterfly” the dead fish for better presentation
• Again, the deckhand will know what is effective.
• Not recommended to use rigs with very long paternoster branches because it will annoy everyone around you and the rig will probably get stuck on the sea bed.

SPANISH MACKEREL

• Live Baiting
• Use 7x7 uncoated wired leader
• Luring
• Use 35-60g Sinking Minnow
• Jigging
• Use treble and/or wired assist hooks

Hope this is helpful.

Miri Luconia DeepSea Fishing 18-25 May 2023

 I had a chance go Luconia Shoal fishing with Ah Seng on his Starfish 5 boat from 18 to 25 May.

Took Air Asia direct to Miri, Malaysia. The air fare is pretty affordable and they do not count fishing equipment as sports equipment. 

The food is okay but unecessary. Proabably should have just bought some food over at Malaysia.

Ah Seng meet with us at the air port and we loaded our tackle.

We stopped by to eat some food for lunch.

The food was average but was pretty affordable. This cost 35RM.

We stock up some food such as fruits, snacks & drinks here. Ah Seng only provide 3 meals and mineral water. It was better before Covid days and he would provide supper and soft drinks.

We boarded and set off for fishing!

I caught quite a number of fishes. This trip is interesting because 8 of the 10 people are using electric reels with bottom rigs. Ah Seng actually asked the organiser to buy 130kg of bait but most of it went unused because we managed to catch squid and tunas.

Here are some random clips I took.

So we ended the trip by shipping the fishes back. We engage some company to freeze and pack the fishes. The frozen fish will travel to JB by freight and by road to Jurong port. It was not worth the effort and the fishes were no longer fresh as it could be. It came back with some smell and needed extra washing in ice water.

We caught a 24kg black grouper. We know because the shipping company weigh it.

We also caught a sizable Amberjack estimated around 30kg.

Everyone was assigned a basket to bring their share of fishes back.

Taobao electric reel rods are all the rage. Two of the kaki bought a pair of them. One of the rods broke partly because the butt is hollow and also the rod holder is too shallow. Luckily the electric reel's cable held up and the deckie could quickly save it. The funny thing is the safety harness was at the bottom at the butt.

Due to limited number of batteries on board, some angler had to face some down time when the crew charge the battery. Ah Seng uses car batteries to power the electric reels.

The trip ended with some fireworks before we came back onshore. It was a bit dangerous when it malfuctioned.

That's all for the trip report for the deepsea fishing! Please comments on the videos if you have any questions.

JAB Jamboree Jigging Rods

Had a chance to try out the JAB Jamboree range of 1 piece jigging rods. The JAB brand is a spin-off of the Jabbers range of products and was create to distinguish itself from the usual travel multi-piece rods sold. Here are some of the videos. 

We managed to hit a gold mine of golden snappers and they put up a good fight!

For this trip, Samuel managed to land a sizable cobia using a pe 0.6-1.5 jigging rod. The fight took some time and we all had to make way for him. Fortunately he landed it or we will be very pissed. lol.

 

Introduction to fishing lures

I finally came around to make a video about working the different kind of lures using the different Daiso lures I bought quite a number of years ago. I even scanned the instructions from the packaging. 

Really hope they bring the different lures back. 

In summary

Crankbait - Slow retrieve

Vibe - Constant retrieve after getting the depth

Minnow - Irregular retrieve or twitching

Shad - Pausing at the strikezone

Popper - clug and pause

Pencil - Walk the dog

DAISO Burakuri ブラクリ Works!

I bought a pack of these and tried them out in one of the local canals/monsoon drains.

It worked perfectly with the proper bait. The trick is to just leave in on the bottom and since it is quite light, the fish will take the entire hook, line and sinker. Leaving it dangling in mid water is not so effective.