It was late and we were running out of bait. So we decided to fillet a fish that we caught earlier and use it as bait. But the fish were not biting, having a preference for prawn.
Then when we were ready to go, Ivan felt something disturbing his line. He gave it a tug and drew in the line. What a surprise: a huge mud crab got hooked trying to eat the fillet. One of its hind legs got entangled with the hook, and it was caught.
What a going-home surprise catch - a crab for dinner!
A few years ago, American newspapers sensationalized stories of the Snakehead ("Ikan Aruan" in Malay, "lay he" in Hokkien) found in the Potomac River, Lake Michigan, a California lake and a few public ponds, calling the event "Snakehead Invasion".
As a boy, I used to chase and catch the aruan in ankle-deep water in the drains beside Changi Road. What fun I had then.
But the Americans are funny. They are terrified of the "snakehead invasion", as they call it, and calling the fish "vicious", "toothy monster", and "Frankenfish".
The foto above shows a snakehead that we caught recently. When my mother underwent an operation many years ago, she was advised by her friends to eat a snakehead as part of the cleansing diet! They claimed that the snakehead has medicinal value.
(Read what the Smithsonian reported:
www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/snakeheads.html)
Yes, catch a tarpon or fish free, says this online advertisement on http://tarpontrips.com from America. They are so sure that they can take you to the spot in Florida Keys where you will catch your tarpon that they quarantee you a free trip if no tarpon gets hooked!
BTW: The tarpon there are really big, averaging 5 feet in length!
Wow, I might just go there one day and catch my giant tarpon, wouldn't you?
But in the meantime (sigh), this is the size of tarpon I catch - twenty inches long! (Waa, very big by Singapore standard.) And you wouldn't eat it too - it tastes like tissue paper!
So, practise C&R - Catch & Release!
One dull day at a kelong off Pulau Sibu in Malaysia, I was complaining that the fish were not biting. Anwar, a kelong hand, then thought that he should inspire me. He took out his handphone and showed me a video of a 2-hr fight with a Sting Ray the week before, the participants of the fight with the huge ray were all kelong hands, taking turns so they would not be tired out. Finally they landed the monster!
Yes, that's the kind of fish I want to catch!
That's the kind of fight I want to experience.
Caught on Sun 17 Jan 2010, my son's latest fish was a peacock bass (I think). Practising C&R (Catch & Release), I slid it into the water for it to swim away free, to live and fight again.
