My First Popper Bream

This is an embarkation on a new form of breaming for me. Anyway, it was not a planned strategy beforehand so a random trip was just made to Five Dock Bay one fine morning. I remembered waking up late and it was already a bright morning, damn, sleepyhead! Anyway, seeing that I've already woken up (not that late actually), might as well go look-see-look-see.

Tried an assortment of soft plastics and not much happening. Walked to a small little mangrove tree and thought of giving my newly acquired StrikePro Rack Popper a try. Made a far first cast and applied all the techniques I read about bream popping. Ploop... ploop... SPLASH!! No connection, damn! Got me excited already! Continued popping the same area and soon, the SPLASH becomes... zzzzz... Yeehar! My first popper bream at 27cm.

Pretty-pretty-no-run-water! After that, it was no return for me. Basically pop the whole session later on for many swirls and misses, diew! It was really really addictive, mind you! Where I was popping, there was a fellow angler not far from me. Suddenly, I heard this bloody loud drag. I saw this guy fighting the fish like curry. So stopped my popping and ran over to busybody a bit. His Daiwa Steez 2506 went berserk, super loud drag and very solid cranking, almost made me partially orgase right on the spot! hahaha.. At first I thought it might be a jewfish but as soon as he tamed it to the bank, it was a huge bream! He told me he's only using 4lb leader and that's why his drag is loose, quite professional angler I'd say. The way he played the fish was quite confident, take my hats off him. I volunteered to go down the steps and help him body-lift this monster, it was BIG, at 42cm total, 39cm to the fork!

Made our acquaintances and pleased to meet Eric. A very courteous bloke and very willing to share knowledge. He caught it on a ZipBaits Rigge Deep 35F, the colour was a unique black hue. Had a sudden *Evil* thought which I always joked with Chen when we saw cool gears of other anglers we met while fishing. The next moment you hear is *SPLASH*... hehe... Unfortunately, this grandpa bream won't be able to be caught by me in the future... sad...

Continued popping non-stop for almost 2 close hook-ups. It went quiet and I left with the constant thoughts of all the swirls, splashes, and close-calls. I'm officially hooked to TOP-WATER action! Ganbatte!

Ronald