Human Outsmart Kings

Yes, there comes a day when human can outsmart kings one bloody fine day. That human being is Jiaming. As it was gonna be a shit windy week ahead, I asked JM if he wanna go another round on Monday after being teased by those berley swimming kings on Saturday. He's definitely keen as mustard to get those buggers. This is my 2nd time round prepping the boat by yourself truly and I seemed to get it done more faster. Still, had to pick him up a bit later but we were on the road as scheduled. He was lamenting to me how he has a new plan of attack to outsmart them if they were again coming up to the berley trail and very very optimistic was he detailing to me the techniques and stuffs! Launched the boat easily on a slightly upcoming tide and we were off in a jiffy to squidding duties.

Surprisingly, it wasn't as cold as the weekend, and we had the whole squidding area to ourselves with only one lonely boat sighted. We anchored as per usual and the drift wasn't really a pain-in-the-ass. JM was pumped and signalled a probable great day out. The current was luckily non-existence and I was quickly registered on the scoreboard with a good size squid. Almost made a fool of myself when that bugger slipped through the net and went back into the drink! With my sudden lightning fast reflex, I grabbed the bugger from the surface! It didn't swim off straightaway which made me baffled?! Haha, lucky me, unlucky squid! It was indeed one of Brooker's best squidding session, we had 6 squids and 2 cuttlefish with many more dropped and knew we had more than enough bait. A picture of the 6 squids destined for a more 'happier' place..

We left the squid ground on schedule this time and ride through a pretty calm harbour with little cold winds. After anchored, JM rigged up his unweighted squid head while I bottom bashed Jarvis combo with the cuttle head. Whilst prepping berley, JM's blackhole went off in relatively low light condition! I was like, huh? King's woke up so early?! Nah, it was a trevally instead! But what a RUN! Finished the berley and the squid-rigged rods weren't getting any customers by then except pesky pickers. The light came on and we proceeded flicking little berley out. JM was on watch for any of Saturday's surfacing kings phenomenon. True enough, it needn't take long when we spotted 1 or 2 swimming around the trail. JM quickly tossed his squid and opted his new technique. IT WORKS.. why? Just listen to his intro in the following vid:

Too bad it was undersize (55cm) but who cares?! This bloke is no longer a king virgin, and only on his 3rd trip?!! Well done lah, at least he found out a new technique.. orthodox.. unorthodox.. who CARES?! He caught those kings that thought we're stupider than them! Ha..ha..

Then, the rest is history in the making. 20 minutes later and after more berley, he spotted another king destined to be outsmarted. Did the same ol' and once again, Jiaming was featured in this following vid:

Maybe he's the new GTK-on-the-block? Anyway, this king almost made it to legality but fell on 59cm, and caught on the same method. Congrats man.. When all else fails, he improvised.

Well, seemed like getting so much squids for NOTHING! All I could muster up was a good size Fan-bellied Leatherjacket! And caught on size 4 baitholder hook on a squid strip?! WTF.. my gong tao just wasn't there for me.. Oh well, consoled myself by keeping it for makan..

It was getting really sunny by then and we were getting nailed consistently by the silver trevallies. JM and I kept ourselves entertained and released quite a lot of these buggers. There were only a few breams in between. I thought it was Monday and Joe was around in college to cook and so told JM we needed to keep 5 for the table. Well, just when we had 2 in the icebox, one trev swam to the anchor rope and I had to undo this bloody drama! After untangling all the mess, I was contemplating to leave with those 3 trevs only. But JM said let's continue for awhile more and meet that target. We re-anchored back and then suddenly, the trevs went quiet! KNNBCCB!!! Well, not for long.. the 1st drop of cube pillie by JM was taken and this was the career highlight for him in Sydney. We wanted trev but he ended up being filmed in the next video:

Yes, 3 kingies in a day for this bloke. This is the true HAT-TRICK! It was undersize and back it went. Finally, after some minutes, the trevs responded to our last scoop of berley and we got the other 2 trevallies. Packed up and went back with a very tired Jiaming but definitely a very happy tourist. Great stuff.

Donut Ronald

A New Trevally Annihilator

We were set for our usual weekend getaway and Skipper Chen was supposed to give the green light. This time round, we have a Singaporean deckie on hand. However, Chen had to pull out as he was too dead tired after a hectic work week and little sleep. But he urges me to bring Jiaming out and so he being an awesome mate, helped me prep Brooker and I was off in a jiffy to pick up my deckie. Jiaming was dead set keen to land his first Sydney king and hopefully it'll be this trip.

We got to Tunks a bit late but nonetheless it was quiet on a Saturday morning. However, it was bloody freezing! As it was at the highest tide, launching was easy. Got to squid ground and there were already the weekend crowd working that area. We quickly anchored at the usual corner and didn't want to waste much time. It was getting colder and colder for no apparent reason, and the wind wasn't helping much either! To top it more disastrous, the outgoing current was horrendous, racing fast which even made my paternoster hard to reach the bottom. Jiaming was 1st to react with a cuttlefish on his kmart jig. However, that was the end of that wonderful jig, donated to a snag. I had a few 'huggy' cuttles but they simply would not get jag on the spikes! It was getting desperate and soon the 'window of opportunity' came. We left later than usual with only ONE cuttle to ride on the whole session!

With only a small little cuttle, it meant only 2 piece of meat after u separate out the 'surf board' (bone structure which can be used for bird food). I had to further strip that 2 piece into a 4 piece! So I took a piece and rigged it on blackhole combo and hack the idea of rigging the bottom JW. This time I only had a size 4 baitholder hook and just lightly pin the strip hoping it'll drift naturally. Not sure how long it took but it wasn't that long before blackhole went ballistic. I picked up and fought this bugger. Yep, the blistering 1st run on a slowly tighten drag sure gave away the tell-tale sign of a kingie run. But honestly speaking, this king so far wasn't as impressive as the previous I've caught. Didn't remember if I did check whether Samurai was gonna be spooled but all I could remember is, the king surface up quite fast. Then, Jiaming saw a king came up with my hooked one and I quickly asked him to drop his strip down. I then power steer my king over the other side of the boat and tried to net it myself since he'll be busy enticing the other king. It was quite a mayhem time I remembered but it doesn't really matter and soon I self-net a 63.5 cm Yellowtail Kingfish!

Well, at least it proved that kings do take cuttlefish! A pity the other king wasn't interested in Jiaming's offers but as soon as he dumped the berley, a school of kings surfaced! They were rummaging through the berley trail and I asked Jiaming to try cube pilchard instead. However, all methods fail. The kings were soon gone and what a bummer we couldn't fool those bloody kings!

Anyway, to compensate Jiaming's uneventful day with tricking the kings, he was totally destroying the local trevally population! HE became their WORST NIGHTMARE! Trevs after trevs he striked them like it was child's play. I was also having my fair share of fun, whilst testing out the Gamakatsu circle hooks I just bought. They were amazing hooks, as sometimes when you leave the rod on the holder, the fish will 'auto hook' themselves! Good thing too about circle hooks is that it always hooked to the side of the fish mouth, thus reducing the risk of swallowing it. Good news is, the trevallies are starting to run more and headshake less, yahoo!!!

Ronald

Lures My Worst Enemy?

To my wallet of course! KNNBCCB, no income still keep buying tackles and lures! Ok lah, I know my limit. Anyway, forgot to post a pic of a previous capture when I was in Double Bay trying out the Bassday Sugar Deep minnow I got couple of weeks back. Scored a nice 35cm whiting which I took home to try out how nice they taste.

That was it for that session. The whiting was filleted and I shared it with Jeff. We just simply pan fry it in olive oil and applied some tartare sauce, sensational! They have quite a good taste on it and very little bones.

Then as usual, hand itchy and always monitoring lures on eBay. Have been eyeing on a Megabass lure for quite sometime but just couldn't bid on a cheap price. Got fed up and finally took one on a 'Buy-it-now'. Cost me about AU$22 and finally my Live-X Smolt arrived from Jepun!

The time has come again when Compleat Angler tackle stores are having their stocktake sale. That means burning a bigger hole in my wallet! Ok lah, very controlled this time. They were having massive sales on the SX40 lures but still cost $14.90! Not as cheap as last time when I got them during their hardbodies 20% discount. So, bought a Smith Towadi surface plug at $16, a Squidgy Secrets Part 4 dvd and a pack of 1/0 Gamakatsu Circle hooks. I even got a free Shimano Cap!

Fucking dvd was a rip-off! The production was crap, and I kept getting pauses on lots of scenes! Not to mention they took so much footages from the 'Fishing DVD' shows which I have already own them! KNNBCCB!!! Those cb Bushy and Starlo ah-laus! Cheat my money!

As usual, hand itchy, so took the towadi lure and try out at my favourite surface action spot. Finally I managed to work those 'walk-the-dog' lures to better action and control! Can seriously tell you they rock, the action was damn sexy. Though downside is that it's only 1.8g and casting them is not so ideal from land. Anyway, no follows whatsoever. Think the surface water temperature is dropping now and they don't feed on the prawns anymore. Tried the modded Smolt and only managed one silver biddy!

What a way to break this lure's virgin! Boring.. That was it for that session. Nowadays I've been doing too little luring and too much boating! Arghhh!!!

Ronald

My First Australian Salmon.. FINALLY!

After scoring the hat-trick, I was itching to get out again. GTK's bro was in Sydney and so I gave a call to Jiaming and took him out on Brooker with me being the skipper for the day. Picked him up at 4am and we were off to Tunks. He had a crash course on launching and had to be the deckie for the day too. This time round, I made sure I launched on the center lane even though it was a bloody low tide. Well, there was no trailers around on a cold monday morning! Off we went to the squid grounds and crash course this squid virgin. But I must say, he had really inherited his brother's GONG TAO! The start was slow though and with the drift being a pain-in-the-ass, I anchored at the cuttle spot and Jiaming had just finished rigging with the jigs his brother passed to him. The outgoing current was strong and he had trouble getting those size 2 jigs down whilst I was also struggling with the paternosters. Then, suddenly he said he had a snag and I thought how the hell he could still wind it in if it was a snag?! Then, the 'blow-job' pulls started and it was his 1st arrow squid and a good size! Squid virgin no more! Then the rest is history, with him scoring 4 cuttles and missing a few, whilst I ate donuts! The time had come for us to hit the kingie spot and so off we went with 50% of the equation solved.

The incoming tide had started and the anchoring done in a good position. We quickly rigged up our usual setups before I prep the berley. At the same moment, staring at the constant pickers on my JW set at the bottom. Tough luck, today there was no customer on the JW, and our shared squid head scored nothing. Jiaming then proceeded getting onto his 1st ever bream on his newly acquired 4 piece Ofmer rod he got in Singapore, quite a nice piece! I also started rigging up the unweighted strip on the blackhole. By then, Jiaming had also scored his 1st silver trevally. An amazing thing then happened when we both placed our rod resting on the transom of brooker with unweighted strips. Both rods went off zzzzzzz.... at the same time and it was quite hardout! But by the time we could react, there were no hookups! I was very tempted to call for king runs and how awesome it'll be if it was on 2 rods! Who will net for who? Hahahaha... Jiaming seemed to do quite well, getting onto a few more breams and trevs. But this trip never went DRAMA-FREE! At one point, Jiaming was telling me why the anchor rope was floating on the surface, true enough, I pulled it in and the anchor with the chains were gone! The knot was still there but the shackle might have opened and free-up the rope! Fark, $40 gone! Might have been divers playing a prank on us, or the shackle had gave way? Luckily Jiaming told me we could tie the rope onto the structure and I positioned the boat 'swee-swee' for him to do it. At least that gave us additional fishing time when we were almost contemplating to leave early!

I re-rigged blackhole with a new strip and cast. Within a few moments, blackhole just went nuts! I called for king and fought it. The way the line moved was baffling. The fish went on surface and started going right to left. Then, at one point, it was determined to head for the structure. Both me and Jiaming knew this one was gonna be lost. I up-ed the drag more and skull drag the fucker away and she co-operated. Soon, while it was just a few meters away, she JUMPED! Damn, not a king, but a new specie for me which I've been hunting for a long long time!!! A 53cm Australian Salmon had finally gave me the right to take a photo with, SONG AH!!!

Sadly, no kings for us. Another bloody drama happened. When Jiaming was fighting a fish which was giving him more difficulty, his 4 piece Ofmer rod broke! And it broke at the thickest part! WTF??!! There goes his $50 rod and I told him this salmon had cost us $80 today! Funny Jiaming performed some stunts and continued fighting that fish without a rod. But this bugger was strong, it went underneath brooker and without a rod, Jiaming couldn't steer it away. The leader broke and he wasn't feeling that happy I can tell you that! I'm so curious what that fish was, DIEW!

Passed him the blackhole for him to continue his session and by then, we had caught a few trevallies. There were heaps of them but they just headshake all the way, don't know why they are so weak at this moment! Took a vid of GTK's bro battling his "BORING" trev, hahahaha..

Left around 10am and headed back on a very calm Sydney Harbour. Put the boat back in HQ and we proceeded to grab a feed at maccas. A very accomplished fisho this guy was, and he told me his career highlight was a 15kg Toman (snakehead) he caught at their backyard! Almost shit myself!

Ronald

Hat-Trick Kings

The time comes again for what seemed like almost a routine. To prove a pattern can repeat itself, skipper Chen called for another session to confirm this phenomenon. The wind forecast wasn't all that ideal, going roughly around the 15/20 knots of cold westerly. Sunday was supposed to be better but Chen had something on and so a day earlier we shall go. We grabbed some juice and berley the night before and with the compulsory squid jigging duties, we aren't that keen anymore to stock up on fresh pilchards. To get fresh baits, we had to leave HQ while every other normal human beings are busy playing chess with granpa zhou. Did everything as per normal but somehow or rather, drama always have to occur! Whilst launching at Tunks Park on a low tide, I went a little to the extreme end of the concrete pave. Reversing too much and suddenly heard a *THOMP*! Fark... the right trailer wheel fell into a deep V-shape pothole! I tried to rev civic to get out but to no avail. In pitch black condition, we were in shock. Experienced skipper Chen quickly suggested pushing the boat out even without water to support the hull! Luckily it was not hard considering there were 2 of us. A quick inspection on the trailer bearings and axle showed no major damage. We hand lifted the trailer out of the bloody pothole and drove it out for better inspection. Luckily there was no damage probably due to Brooker being light. What a DRAMA! Chen was saying this trip better be worthwhile for all these shits that happened!

Brooker drove beautifully to squid spot and it was kinda low tide. We tried drifting but proved rather fruitless though the current wasn't as bad as last week. Chen was 1st up with a good size arrow on his Yamashita. We got fed-up with the drift and decided to anchor. Rigged up the blackhole with the yozuri double paternoster and soon, I got a cuttle. The paternoster proved to be the winner that day scoring 3 cuttles and I dropped one squid on my single Yama. It was a bit late by the time we decided to call off and so a quick rush was in order to try and discover the phenomenon.

We quickly prep our gears and didn't even bother to berley 1st. First down was my Jarvis Walker bottom bashing combo. As usual, put on the squid head and I went on to prep my blackhole. Not long later, the 4000 shimano went zzz for a short while but no hookup. It woke us up from a sleepy cold saturday morning for sure. Ok, the kings are still around in the harbour. Brought up the squid head for a check and it was still there. Then, as I slowly dropped the bait down and begin closing the bail arm, JW rod buckled over and I felt a heavy pull. The shimano did its zzzz-ing thing and we knew it was definitely a king. This bugger ran from the starboard side where my rod was resting to the bow side. I knew I was straight into trouble as the 20lb mono was going under the hull. Quickly positioned the rod into the water and applied more drag. As I was about to swing the rod over the stern, the zzzz stopped and JW swung back to idle. ARGHHHHH!!!! KNNBCCB!!! Kingfish 7, Ronald 3. Brought up to check and hook still there! The bait was gone though. It threw hook and I straightaway diagnose it to be wrong size hook problem. Brought out a 3/0 and rig up the cuttle head. Same thing happened to cuttle head not long later when it just goes zzzzzzz.... and then nothing! Bad luck I supposed! Oh well, we concurred that cuttlefish seemed to work on kings too!

Soon, we missed the bottom bashing window of opportunity and was more convinced that those window periods we experienced seemed to prove more and more true. Blackhole was rigged up with a squid strip unweighted and I kept myself busy with cubing on the ET. At one point, the blackhole was catching 3 good size trevallies and the strip was still re-usable. Maybe I was lazy to cut a new strip or simply just cheapskate. Well, this strip later proved to be magical! It was already in a raped shape, and I still continued to cast it out after catching a few fish with it already. Then, as we're already getting used to trevallies doing the zzzzz thing on the daiwa samurai reel, the next run was different. The blackhole bent more and the zzzz was going on afterburners. Ok, we called for a king and I picked up the rod. Drag was tightened and luckily it auto-swim the line out to the open area. But, with this crappy reel and limited line, I soon got into the panic mode of whether the fish will cut me off or spool me. Again, I saw the backing, but I didn't say anything this time as I was speechless, and only concerned about when it'll stop and let me wind the handle like a mad-dog. She co-operated at a few stages, and we could even take those moments to diagnose when the bloody hell it had became tired. True, the 4th to 5th runs were short bursts and we soon could see colour. King it was and from the water, it looked a bit bigger than last week. Chen easily netted it and we scored a nervously 61cm measured on the lie detector. TAPAO ah!!!

This king caught on the unweighted just proved that the phenomenon is so true at the late hour of our session. Just when we thought all was over with one king and more trevs for this particular session, another magical thing happened. That squid strip was still around when the king was netted, and so continued to use it AGAIN! Haha.. it was already in a very very bad shape but what the heck, got means got, don't have means don't have, right?! Just before 10 minutes we were supposed to pack up and go for maccas brekkie, blackhole got whacked again and I picked it up and thought it was a trev because of the weak run. But somehow it didn't headshake and I thought what the heck it was. It was quite easily brought up and to our surprise, it was my 2nd Watsons Leaping Bonito! There was a king following it and I quickly told Chen to switch-bait it! I kept the watson in the water as teaser while Chen quickly dropped his cuttle strip. The king was soon gone but a school of watsons started swimming around. We were so excited like a bunch of school kids playing. I told Chen to use pillie instead and helped him cut up the pillie while another hand holding the rod with a swimming watson, crazy shit! He almost got a take once but failed the hookup. The watsons were soon gone and we brought this poor bugger up and started to pack up and leave.

Unfortunately, got back late due to extra time playing the watsons. We had burgers instead of muffins but at least we're still doing our usual routine. Scored hat-trick and now only hoping that solving this mystery will help us continue the trend. Hooyah!

Ronald

Respect Kingfish In Our Stomach

It's been too long since I've last FLOGGED (fish-blogging). No choice, my uncle and family came from Singapore for holiday here in Sydney. Anyway, did went brookering with Skipper Chen for our usual sydney harbour assault last weekend. Phil was supposed to join us but seemed like he is still not as fishnuts as us cos' he was busying playing chess with granpa zhou. Left HQ at an ungentlemanly hour of 3.30am to the boat ramp. Easy launch and startup and we were off with just approximately half a tank of juice. Got to squid grounds and started rigging up. It was outgoing tide and the current was strong. We then secretly anchor on the most shallow part although it was not allowed, guess we're no different from the whiskey oscar golfs! Heck care lah, since we're asian-finessers, we'll also anchor finesse style! Since current was too strong, I opted to use my yozuri paternosters. 1st cast and I already had a take, but no hookup. The current was damn strong, even Chen had difficulty getting his 1.8 down deep. Luckily I got an arrow pretty quick in that session and a first on the paternoster! Woohoo! Plenty of boats there were doing it hard, with many of them drifting non stop. Well, that was all we managed, with Chen loosing hookups and so that quite good size squid had to make do as the light was fast approaching.

Scoot off just before 6 to our previous kingies spot. As the tide was outgoing, we had to anchor on the other direction. Berley and berley 1st before we rig up. Did the same ol' and had one unweighted and one at the bottom. The bottom was quickly dessimated by the pickers that were probably attracted by the berley. The unweighted was luckily not molested probably because the bait couldn't get down deep enough due to the current. So did our cubing duties and was soon rewarded with breams and trevallies. Got a trev which didn't run like a trev, worse than the breams that morning! I even lost one around the motor, as their lips are notorious of being ripped out by their constant headshakes. Chen got a good run on his loose drag revros which turned out to be a bigger one compared to mine on his squid. Hooked up to a bream only to have it swallowed the hayabusa hook deep! In the process of retrieving the hook, the bream died, seeing it was legal size, we kept it. Maybe our anticipation was high to hook a king and that's why the multitudes of breams wasn't making us interested! But luckily, towards an almost very late timing to consider any possibilities of kings swimming around, the blackhole combo had a huge bend and the little daiwa samurai reel went zzzzzzzzzzzzz...

I remembered reeling in that unweighted piece to check and Chen had helped me bait up with a rather small strip that I thought was really small to entice! Well, we only had a squid and had to make sure that squid was enough for the session. Anyway, back to the fight...

The line was brought from the starboard side to port side, luckily I lowered the rod into the water and quickly swung it over the bow of brooker! Ok, this king cooperated and swam out instead of going to structures. But, it was on afterburners. The crappy samurai had really limited braid and it had many knots on it that I had joined up last time when respooling! The drag cap was crappy too, and I wasn't getting the right adjustment. At one point, I had to do some crazy stunts like using two fingers to add pressure on the cap, farkin funny man! Then the same ol' happened..

Ronald: "Bro, I think I'm gonna get spooled"
Chen: "U sure bro?!"
Ronald: "Yeah bro, see the backing?"
Chen: "Oh fuck"

But.. But... maybe this blackhole was blessed by GTK since he gave it to me, and just before the yellow colour line disappears from the spool, the king stopped. I wind like mad only for awhile before it started doing the zzzzz thing again, KNNBCCB! Ok, luckily it was not a long run probably telling me she's tired already. So, wind like mad again and this time better, could gain back more, at least to give me more confidence I'm pumping her up away from possible snags below. A few more bursts before we could see colour. King it was and Skipper Chen already standby with the net. It was an easy netting job and up came my 60cm king! Bloody hell! Only 60 and it made such a tough job for me! Oh well, at least now the score is Kingfish 6, Ronald 3. Arghhh!!!

So many thoughts ran through my mind while playing that fish, and I always felt I'll lose the fish! But the blackhole combo was really blessed. Too bad the majority of lost fish was to be on my ET combo, damn unlucky for kings! I can land bonitos to frigates on the ET but not for kings, DIEW! It was the time again for maccas brekkie and after staying there for another hour or so for not even breams, we gave up and headed back to HQ.

We saw Taylor in the kitchen and being a chef at the Sydney Wharf Restaurant, he helped us sashimi it on the spot! The king tasted even better after just being dead for only 4 hours, talked about freshness!! Brought back 2 trevs and a bream for not a really bad session.

Then during evening, Taylor cooked up the trevs and bream with his restaurant recipe which he says could easily cost $30 a plate! Woohoo! Shiok ah!

Had the best fish meal and looking forward to the continuing trend we've been facing for 2 consecutive weekends.

Ronald

Team StMike Finally Scored!

FINALLY!!! After so many many attempts, team stmike can proudly hold up these creatures of the deep for a victory shot! As usual, my fishing partner-in-crime gave the ops order for our weekend little getaway. We also wanted to make sure Brooker's motor was ok after making sure the fuel hose adaptor is the cause of last week's problem. All it need was a rubber band trick. We did the usual and left for Tunks early. Passed through the green marker and Chen fired up Evinrude. Yes, it performed well and no sweat at all, brooker, u beauty! Got to squid spot in a jiffy and started rigging up. This time the drift was tricky, and we had to motor around many times. It just made us more eager to invest on an electric. Suddenly saw a boat came up near to our usual spot and started anchoring?! WTF?! I thought can't anchor there? Anyway, they are whiskey oscar golfs so I guess they don't give a F. I was trying out a new rig with 2 faulty squid jigs my hey-day fishing friends donated to me. Made a paternoster out of the 2 jigs and they practically were useful because of the missing weights on them. Put on some deodorant for the jigs and on the first drop, I'd already registered some hits on the paternoster squid jigs! At one point, I thought I got something and slowly pull in the rig, only to see 2 squids chasing the two jigs! But alas, was unsuccessful in jagging them. The drift was too dangerous and we had to keep avoiding the structures. We drifted quite far away only to make Chen in successfully getting one small specimen away from our usual spot. It was almost towards the end of the biting period and Chen decided to motor slowly away from structures when I still had my good ol' trusty Yamashita in the water. As soon as Chen turned off the motor, my ET reel was making sound! This squid pulled drag and was hardout! We were both shocked and I slowly and surely made sure the squid stayed on. Holy shit! Chen helped me net up my biggest Southern Calamari and we were both over the moon!

Roughly measured and the back to the head (without tentacles) is 30cm. First time I encounter squidding with drag pulling capability, awesome. With Chen's small arrow and my calamari, we reckon it'll be enough bait, plus the first light was starting to appear. We wrapped up and headed to soak some baits. Used Chen's arrow 1st and I took the head and rig up on my Jarvis Walker stick with Jialiang's donated Shimano 4000 reel with 20lb daiwa mono. With minimal weight and doing the 'Greenwich' rig, I "almost" bottom bash the squid head. Then while I was prepping the blackhole combo, the JW rod suddenly bend big time! But no hookup. We got excited but alas, continued with our other duties. Few minutes later, the rod buckled over and the line was peeling. All hell's break loose. Picked up the crappy JW and started battling this beast that seemed very likely to run like a king. Chen as pro as a good skipper reeled in the remaining rods and standby with GTK's donated net. The fight was on and the constant verbal encouragements from my skipper made sure it was like a Rocky Balboa movie. At one point, Chen was using tai-yu to cheer me up?! (i seemed to hear it) Hahahaha... good one bro! Luckily this one had played clean and I was practically just fighting it on the port side. Chen had no drama netting it and voila! A 63cm kingfish for Team StMike, HOOYAH!

Now, I must say this famous quote from GTK (but modified)... "I love.. jarvis walker man.." But, only that quote, cos' the later quote.. "I respect.. I respect I (kept) the fish.." is said by yours truly.. kekeke... Chen did the honors of quality control and made sure the fish was fresh for Team StMike's Sashimi Mob. Then, Chen passed me some new hooks he recently acquired called Hayabusa and they are bloody sharp carbon hooks! One hook one dollar neh! I rig up the hook and did cubing to pass time while bait soaking the other 2 combos. Suddenly, it felt like bream bites and so I striked thinking that it was the right time. At first the fish ran for short burst, and I thought it was bream. Chen asked me what it was and I said "bream". Then, my 'show-off' (hao-lian) ET reel made those zzzzz sound like no tommorrow. Chen said, "u sure bro?" Ok, don't think it's bream.. This bastard played damn dirty, ran hardout and took me from starboard side to port side of brooker. At the same time, I have to adjust the rear drag which made me look like an idiot fighting a king on my $30 combo. 6lb fireline and 10lb vanish was definitely punished, and to top it all off, I told Chen: "bro, I think I'm getting spooled". I haven't see my backing yet but the fresh lines were already exposed, and she was still zzzzzzz-ing on quite a tight drag I supposed. Then, without gaining much line, the inevitable happened. It got SNAGGED!!! WTF??!! Yup, I told Chen I couldn't move the rod or reel, like a stalemate. He offered to anchor up and move the boat over and see if there's any chance the fish will come out. Whilst he was doing it, I tried to gentle flick the rod and suddenly I could feel movements! The fish was still there! But don't know why later on, the line went SLACKED!!! ARGHHHH!!!! Wind in the line and honestly, it took ages as this bastard almost spooled me. To my shock, the whole leader was still there, but the hook and small sinker was missing. I suspected the knot gave way and thus that king earned a new "hayabusa piercing". Tally now becomes: Kings 5, Ronald 2. KNNBCCB!!!

Then, it was history in the making. Chen had never landed or even fought a king before, and today was the day of reckoning. He was using unweighted squid strip from his small arrow and there was a previous occassion when his Revros burst a few times but no hook up. I told him to let the fish take it longer before you strike. Soon, the scenario repeated again. This time, his drag was set loose and the fish took it but did the: "zzz.. stop.. zzz.. stop.. zzz.." Then, on a longer run, I told him to strike. He wacked the rod and the Revros went crazy! Unluckily, whilst he did that, the 8lb braid sliced through his finger and cut him very very bad! Anyway, the fight was on and this one was even better on his light 2-4kg Procaster and 2000 size Daiwa Revros. Woohoo.. my kingfish-virgin skipper was battling his long-awaited specie to add. I was too engrossed in making sure all other lines are in and standing by with a net that I forgot to grab my camera out and take a video of it, DIEW!!! It'll be like: zzzzzzz... stop (ok bro, wind in now!) then zzzzzz.. (bro, let it run!), stop (bro, pump and wind like mad!).. This was the encouragements I gave to my skipper, and he did it like a pro with his light outfit. I don't know if he did orgase but I know I would! This kingie played clean and moments later, we saw her and my lousy netting skill only managed to get it in at the second attempt. Sorry bro. But still, Chen beat me! He scored his 1st at 64cm! Tamade!!

Happy bloke and he sent a mobile pic to Jenny for bragging.. haha! U beauty! I was damn happy for Chen as he finally broke the duck on these elusive creatures. As usual, my skipper did the quality control. My bottom bash rod and unweighted transom squid had no takers. Chen passed me his last piece of hayabusa hook and I continued the cubing business. Got another bream take and did the same ol'. AGAIN! The 1st run was like a pussy bream burst, then I wind in a bit. 2nd run was zzzzz-ing longer.

Chen: "what is it bro"
Ronald: "nah bro, trevally, got headshakes"... "yup, definitely"..

Then, wind in the 2nd time and only for a bit then on the 3rd run, the zzzzz went longer and changed direction to the structure!

Chen said: "bro, u sure?"

Ok, I called for king by now. A second one on cubing!!! This one I did a major mistake. I was reluctantly in adjusting the drag, and she took it gutsily towards the structure. By then, Chen frantically wind in the other rods. But in split second, I knew I would stand no chance, because it was heading dead straight for the structure. True enough, this fight was short-lived and my line went slack. (Kingfish 6, Ronald 2) ARGHHHH!!!!! Mistake! Mistake! KNNBCCB!!! The leader this time was not there, I believe the structure cut the fireline. Another hayabusa-piercing king swimming around in the harbour.

The score tally was a sad reality. No wonder my grand master Jialiang told me before: "your $30 combo the reel not meant for kings lah". True, I've lost 4 kings on the ET stick, it has never ever landed one before. The statistics says it all. But.. but.. I never point a gun to king's head and asked them to bite my pilchard right? Anyway, it was turning out to be a kings mayhem day. Not long later, while I was crying over spilled milk, Chen's unattended rod had a solid run and he picked it up. The fight was short-lived too. Kings? He said probably no, but I reckon it was. It became pretty quiet on the kings front and we were boating a few breams, and they were on the small side! To be honest, I hooked up lesser breams that day compared to kings! With that shut down, we looked at the watch and decided to do our usual, rush for maccas brekkie!

Got back to HQ and started to process the kingies. Chen took one for his mate derrick and we certainly had plenty for the mob. I sashimi-ed one side and found that they had plenty of meat! It was definitely enough to fill up a plate full of sliced (instead of the usual cubed) HIRAMASA sashimi, YUM!

And at night, before the fish party, I took the other side and did fish burger (sandwich actually) style.

Got some tartar sauce and some fried onions, it was the most enjoyable fish party night for Team StMikes. Hooyah!!

Ronald

Lousy Night Ops

After those 2 previous two consecutive night ops, I thought must continue, cos' all good things comes in three mah?! So this time round, Chen came for the third one with me. The last two nights weather was not bad, but the 3rd round was a bit windy and cold. Still, we went for big plastics. To cut the story short, I only managed small bream and flatties, nothing spectacular to take photo also. And the amount of bites were so little compared to the previous sessions. Had a good burst but failed to hook up, probably due to the fact that I always had the tendency to tighten my line and thus not giving slack line. This might have spooked the fish, but I can't help it since it's too dark and basically it's a feel-feel situation. Anyhow, Chen did managed a good run from this 35cm whiting.

However, this bugger was foul-hooked beneath its throat and the whole camo worm was gone! We called it quits as we were quite buggered and left quite disappointed.

I thought of giving another 4th night go but hanged the idea and opted for a morning quick session the next next day. It was a late high tide but a low one. The idea was to go to my surface action spot and test all my surface lures. Reached there with the sun almost above me. Gave the Lucky Craft Bevy Prop the 1st go and I was trying to figure out how to work a bloody fizzer (that's what the aussies called these prop lures). The propeller behind made noises and some bubbles along the trail. Tried to 'walk-the-dog' but it was not appealing. Tried a few other techniques and it just looked more stupid, though a few occasion there were some curious swirls. Decided to give small little downward twitches aka popping. Suddenly, more swirls were occurring and it kept me more interested in this lure. Finally, there was a take but then it was like pulling in a tree leaf! Yup, a super duper luper muper ultra small tailor took it.

The lure almost the same size as it is! Hmm... perfect live bait size for jewie eh?! Continued with the prop but became damn quiet. Tried popping for a few small splashes. The tide was damn low now and thought what the heck, i'll donate a modified gulp. It's modified because I damn cheapskate, the tail was bitten off and so I self made the tail by trimming. Still.. it can catch a small whiting! Haha..

But later on, the toads decided they must ruin it since I don't give them the chance at night. Tried my Megabass Dog-X Jr and finally knew how to 'WALK THE DOG'!!! The action damn sexy but then, totally no swirls whatsoever, diew!

Then at night, suddenly felt bored and not believing that the night ops are that shitty, I stubbornly went again. REGRET!!! Ok lah, probably 1% better than the previous 3rd round. Actually the purpose is to try out a new attractant I got in the afternoon, it's called MegaStrike.

Smell like pizza! Got it in Compleat for $20! That's it liao.. point of no return.. how? HOW?? To prove it works, I applied it on the Gulps even though it's really unorthodox. Who cares! These are the fishes I thought the Megastrike works.

Bullshit one lah, fish where got like pizza one?! Funny, why I keep on KPKB? Wrapped up the session and went back for beer appreciation time instead.

Ronald

Night Ops Number Two

After the success with the bigger Gulps I've been throwing, I went to Kmart to grab a pack of the 3" minnow in Lime Tiger colour, knowing it's having a 25% discount sale. Only 12 in a pack for $8.20 which is kinda expensive but I guess people says fishing tackles are not meant to catch fish, but the angler! I told Phil that I'm going luring in the night and he was keen to join me. So brought him along and also teach him what was luring. Lent him the blackhole junior that GTK has donated to me but fitted with my friend's Daiwa Samurai reel. It wasn't a good setup for casting light plastics but it doesn't really matter, since most of the bites were occurring near the bank. So gave a few demo to Phil and showed him FISHES got eat plastics. A few flathead came on board to amuse us, until Phil finally showed that a lure virgin can also catch flathead on his first outing!

Well done to Phil on a 36cm legal flattie as his 1st lure-caught fish and on a Gulp grub! Seemed like this lucky bloke always seemed to shine whenever we brought him out fishing. His 1st trip to Greenwich for squidding was also proving that his luck was good by almost scoring a squid, while both me and Chen ate donuts. Anyway, I managed to score something on the Lime Tiger Gulp which didn't fight well.

This bream only measured 31cm, but at least the gulp was no longer a virgin. That night proved to be a very productive night. Phil was getting heaps of bites while I managed more flatties and small breams. Got a very impressive run and thought it was a bream, but turned out to be a 39cm flathead on the Lime Tiger!

Phil said take photo so I take loh. His grub was ravaged and so I changed to a Smelt minnow for him. Suddenly he told me he got something and it was a bigger flattie!

A very well deserved size flattie for him, which would be around 41cm. He was stoked and told me luring is actually quite fun! Haha! I was very happy for him and we wrapped up to catch the SHOOTER movie at broadway. A very well enjoyed short session and also popping cherries! Haha..

Ronald

Night Ops Number One

It's the 'NO-LIFE' Ronald blogging again. Someone told me he like the 'NO-LIFE' life, lucky his CO never hear this, or else sure kena get confinement. This week the highest tides in Sydney is only 1.74m, better than nothing. Now I think I got the night luring bug, because I feel I can safely use the soft plastics without worrying that the farkin toads chew them up like they do so often during daytime. Also, it's cooler now, though already near mid autumn. But on the safety side issue, I make sure I lure at brightly lit areas, especially got lots of street lamps.

Decided this time to concentrate my efforts at the trevally spot. I thought enough is enough for using the gulp grub, it's time to start using bigger Gulps, and so the Smelt 3" minnow was whacked on a size 2 hook jighead. Got the usual flatties and heaps of bites very near the banks. I thought to myself, maybe tonight the fishes are right under my feet. So changed to parallel casts and true enough, more bites and flatty hookups occurred. Then, the thing we fishos always dreamt of... Zzzzz... This bugga gave my kix reel a bloody good workout on a cold night. Up came a 34cm bream, after some nifty rod work and enjoying her multiple runs.

Took quite awhile to take the photos as I waited for all the joggers, walkers, strollers, stalkers.. (?!).. to pass me by before I did the 'stupid asian' thing. Ok, got my happy pics and so she was man-handled all the way to the nearest steps for her ultimate release after enduring some camera flashes. Continued hammering that stretch and suddenly there was a bigger orgasmic zzzzz but no hookup?! KNNBCCB!! That one seemed to be a better one. Anyway, the minnow was still alive and caught me more small breams and flatties before it was too destroyed to stay on the jighead properly. Switched to a lure which I haven't use for super long time. It was a StrikePro which I got from Lure Haven in Singapore. Did some mod to it and voila, second cast of it and got a small bream, lure devirginised!

Continued with it for awhile more and scored some big hits but no hookup. Got tired and left eventually. Not really a hot night ops, but then can't complain. Maybe I too high-standard, can't be lah.

So when the session not too hot, how? Buy lures loh! NO-LIFE Ronald now wants to become NO-MONEY Ronald. Don't know how to write the word "DIE" in chinese. Still got the balls to dig my wallet even though no more scholarship, champion! Never mind, mentality now is eat Maggi Mee... in exchange... got a new Bassday Sugar Deep 50F in Wakasagi colour from eBay. Received the package from Jepun, courtesy of Father Muldoon. The package was opened by Quarantine officer! Stupid seller I told him to write only the word "LURE" in the custom description but I guess his England sucks big time...

Then... because Kmart now sells limited Gulps, I can't resist buying them when there's 20-25% discount on fishing stuffs! So, got a pack of grub and a new saltwater minnow to try, the 3inch minnow in Lime Tiger colour.

That's it, NO-LIFE, NO-MONEY, and plenty of lures.. WTF?! Pathetic me.. sigh..

Ronald