Kayak Fishing Zambales (7-3-2010)

We went to Zambales for the 96th birthday of my wife's grandma. We left for Manila at around 10:30PM. But coming from work, I was too tired to drive further and we decided to spend the night in Olongapo and continue driving the following day.

7am Saturday, we went ahead and drove almost 3 hours to our destination. 10am, I hurriedly unloaded all our stuff and rigged my reels and the kayak. The birthday party will start in late afternoon so I still have a few hours to fish. I rested for a bit then drove to my favorite spot and launched the Kayak. It was almost 12nn and it was scorching. The tide was good so I fished even when the sun was unbearable.

To get away from the sun, I paddled into the narrower tributaries to get under the shade of trees. Rested a bit and then paddled back again into the deeper part of the river. Here's what the tributary looks like. When the tide is right, there are big mangrove jacks cruising in here.

When the water reached the peak tide, I went back to the deeper parts of the river. Luckily, the clouds covered the scorching sun and it started to drizzle.  I threw a huge popper/walker and got a decent sized Mangrove Jack. Around 1.5kg.

The strike was awesome. It was like someone threw a big rock into the water. Like all jacks, it swam full speed to the direction of snags. It was a good thing my reel's drag was recently replaced with Carbontex from Smoothdrag. It was really smooth and subdued the fish with ease.


I still wanted to fish but it was almost 4pm and I had to go back for the party.

Too bad the vacation was very short. We had to drive back to Manila Sunday. We were supposed to leave very early sunday but my hangover was unbearable. I had to sleep it off until lunch. Because of that, I also missed the Haruan tournament in Bulacan. Anyway, there's next time.

A Taste of Haruan Paradise

Me and my cousin JB were originally planning to hit Coloong to scratch our weekly fishing itch. But instead of going to coloong, we received an invitation from Bong. Mr. Alex Ngo and his son Matt, proprietors of Alex Tackle, informed us that there is very interesting place that we really need to visit, and we need to visit it this Sunday. It's one of the most coveted haruan holes Manila --- The source of haruan hunter's wet dreams --- It's none other than the 2.4-hectare pond of QC Wildlife Parks Services. We got to the Wildlife park around 7:30am. When we arrived, we didn't start fishing right away, we proceeded to the Wildlife office next to the pond. Waiting for us there was Mr. Alex Ngo and his son Matt. The pond was huge. It was awesome and the best of all, it's full of Haruans. We waited for the officer in charge to give us the official instructions during the trip. At around 9am, the officer in charge arrived we got the go signal to start fishing. I haven't started rigging yet when Mikko drew the first blood, just in front of the Wildlife office. It was a 1.1kg muscular brute. After a few minutes, he got another. Mikko was burning hot --- maybe because he's using his awesome hot reel. Me, nada! It wasn't until around 10:30am when I caught one using my spinner swimbait combo. We spread out all over the pond, then everyone got lucky until 1pm. Miko got 4, Obet 1, Bong 4, Richard 2. Me, I got 4. We grabbed a quick bite and then went back to the pond. And then it rained really hard. We thought the fishing was over as the rain appeared that it wouldn't stop. By 3pm, it was still raining and we decided that there's no use waiting for rain to stop and we went back fishing. The disturbance on the water made our topwater lures unproductive and we didn't catch anything. By 4, the rain stopped and somehow the Haruans started biting again -- like a switch bulb. Bong hauled a 1.35kg monster and another 1kg while I got 2pcs 1kg fishes. Obet, who was having problems in the morning started hauling Haruans every 5 minutes.It seems as though Mikko's heat transferred to him. From one fish to 5 in around half an hour. It was really awesome. By 5:00pm, my count was seven. Then by 5:30, I got even luckier. We were all concentrated on the north bank of the pond as the bites seemed to occur there. When the bite was appearing to slow down, I went the the corner of the pond and started casting over Lotus leaves, I casted and casted and felt something inhaled my frog -- there was a big swirl and my frog disappeared. By instinct, I set the hook. Luckily, it was a solid grip. Amazingly, the fish swam and pulled line even when my drag was locked. The reel's drag washer started to shudder and I got worried. I thought that either my line will snap or my rod will break. Then the fish swam around the lotus roots. I had no choice but to ran to my right to prevent the fish from getting an angle on my line. While I was running on the bank, I sank chest deep in the lily pads. There I was immobilized and holding the rod high. My sandals was stuck under the mud and I cannot get free. Obet noticed that I disappeared all of a sudden, and ran to my direction. When he saw me on chest deep water, he held the rod while I crawled over vegation to free myself. Once free, I got back the rod and pumped it to gain line. When the fish reached the edge of the lily pad. It again dove under the muck. I had no choice but wade again on chest deep water and then crawled over the lily pads. Finally after freeing the fish, I was able to drag it to shore. When I saw it in full, I was in shock. It was a monster haruan. I held the fish and went back to the rest of the group. Everyone was shocked and we cannot tell for certain how much it weighed. The weighing scale was left inside the pickup truck. When we got back to the office and weighed the fish, it was a 3.11kg monster. The pond is truly a haruan paradise. All in all we landed 25pcs Haruans ranging from 500grams to 1.35kgs. Over 70 strikes. I was skeptical at first because I refused to believe that we can really fish the place.  The Wildlife Parks and Services Pond is off limits to fishing and has been since the very start which was over two decades (if I am not mistaken). When we met the officer in charge, I was proven wrong and we were allowed to fish the entire day. The reason why they allowed us to fish at that time is because they are interested in Sport Fishing and they want to observe anglers and to get some inputs on how they can offer the pond as a recreational pond for the public. They have little idea on what's sport fishing and how it can relate to their conservation efforts and at the same time add additional income for their cause.  We explained that we're fishing for the thrill and rarely take home our catch.We also explained that, as much as we can, we try to help other anglers to practice lure fishing to minimize damage to fishes and, most especially, we promote catch and release. We also explained that other Asian countries now have lots of CnR ponds that cater to a lot of local and international anglers. It wouldn't be that hard to start one in the Philippines. After the day's end, after speaking with the OIC and  one of the managers of the park,h we got very good reception with what we did --- catching, photographing, and releasing the Haruans. They stated that they will work with angler groups to formulate guidelines on how to operate a CnR pond for the public. I sure hope that this will become a reality in the near future. We are so grateful to Matt and sir Alex for arranging the trip and to the management of Wildlife center for letting us fish the pond. Again, thank you so much. It was an awesome trip with Lagiffe (Rich), Mikko, Obet, Bong, JB, Frank, Sir Alex, and Matt. It was a sweet sweet taste of the possible final leg of the Haruan Hunter's Challenge.

Testing a Soft Plastic Lure

It was a long weekend because of the Independence Day celebrations and I planned to try the monster haruans from a new pond in Bulacan. But last minute changes in plan led to my begging out of the trip. Saturday, at around almost noon, I had nothing else to do and decided to try my favorite pond -- Kapitan Larry's Lawak in Coloong, Valenzuela. It's practically a wild brackish lake containing lots of possible catches -- Barramundi, Haruans, Jaguar Cichlids, etc. But after the disastrous flood brought about by the storm named Ondoy, much of Coloong is now trying to recover from terrible loss of fish stocks. After some months, nice sized tilapia, milkfish, and jaguars are being caught by die hard anglers.

With the news of catches from other anglers, I went to Coloong and I was hoping for a barra or two. Unfortunately, no barras caught but I managed to land one haruan. After around 3pm, I called it quits.

Getting a good quality Soft Plastic Swimbait here has been hard lately. The stores that sell them are selling the kinds that, in my opinion, doesn't catch the fishes that I want to catch. If not too big, the soft plastics  that they sell have really poor action, ugly colors, lacks durability, and/or just plain unattractive to fishes.

Anyway, I settled with ordering from online stores from abroad--as usual.

Last Sunday, I received the soft plastics and secretly tried them first before giving my personal review to others. I gave some to Bong for testing. Luckily, we were planning to to go to the private pond in Bulacan the following day.

We got to the pond a bit late but still I was excited to try out the plastics. I hurriedly tied one and went to the pond's edge and started casting. On the third cast, I got a 1.75kg Haruan. That catch made me a believer of the plastic.

When Bong saw my catch and the lure, he tied one as well and after half an hour or so, he also got one.

The lure was hot! I managed to hook 2 more big haruans but lost them when the hook straightened.

The first fish I caught and the one caught by Bong was the only Haruan catches for the day. Both caught using the same plastic.

I even managed to catch a Tilapia using the same lure.