Anything but big cats!

Once again we're in between offshore trips, last minute cancellations and a sudden development of an itch pushes us find avenues to cure that itch. On such short notice, we regularly hit the pay ponds and this particular pond was rather famous for it's variety of fresh water species and large inhabitants. We've grown accustomed to regularly landing decent cats and sometimes it is just too predictable and repetitive.

What we did this time was to set upon ourselves to target everything but the big cats and put our ultralight gear to the test with a variety of tactics specifically to land new catches. Catches weren't epic but we did manage to surprise ourselves with a nice variety to show off.

Boy vs Fish. Sultan on Evergreen's PropMagic75, gently reeled in to not mess up its fragile mouth using Daiwa Emeraldas & Majorcraft's Go-emotion light spinning rod.

We were literally sweeping systematically across as many water column as we can cover and many more surprises ensues to keep our hopes up for catches anything but big cats.

A surprise take, nicely loaded Temujin 'The Spider'.

A common carp, a rare fatty common carp, a rare catch in this pond!

IMA's Spingulf seems to be racking up species after species here, amazing!

We did as best as we can to target anything but big cats, little did we know that we managed to find ourselves a loop hole interpretation of anything but big cats. These weren't big cats. Cats but not big cats. Passable by our standards.

While the heavy geared boys were hauling up pesky big red tails, This Bassday Nin Sui jigged about the bottom landed this little fella.

Nin Sui in the gob, nothing fancy, just bottom jigging, short to medium intervals.

Another small and skinny cat on the Nin Sui.

When we were about to wrap up our session for the day, I managed to get a hit from something big. I guess there's no escape here in hauling big cats and we have nothing to complain about since we've caught a variety of smaller specimens earlier. I take this as a nice send off from the pond to put a zonker at the end of this ultralight setup of Temujin the 'Spider' paired with a Shimano Stella 1000FE spooled with 6lbs line.

Boy wonders what's he doing fighting with that tiny stick.

Wonder no more, one of the redtail bullies attempting to out run my tackle. Ultralight, but packs a mighty fight!

IMA's Spingulf is the way to go here for all sizes of fish here.

I'd say we did pretty good for ourselves and met most of our expectations to catch 'anything but big cats' with a few creative interpretations of our own mandate. Once again, the ultralight setup of Temujin the 'Spider' + Shimano Stella 1000FE does pack a mighty fight.

Bruiser Grouper, tasty grouper, and some clean up after.

We recently got news that there's a recent development of some pond operators opening up options for catch and release (instead of the usual baiting, catch and weight in to be paid by the kilo) with the promise of well stocked bigger barramundis and groupers in the range of 2kgs and above.

Great news and fun for us to fill in between bigger offshore trips. The day started early and gloomy but that didn't stop us from landing barramundis after barramundis. Sad thing about this pond is that the fish aren't in the best condition as there were very little aerial displays and the fights were rather weak for barramundis 2kgs and above. Nonetheless, it did scratch a bit of the itch for tight lines, twitchy loaded rod, and safe to say everyone had some fun in the sun later in the day.

My biggest barra of the day after several mishap and line cuts while retrieving the fish with a lip grip. Photo courtesy of Tackle Source.

Buddy of mine landed another barra using Zipbait's Tiny Khamsin SR.

And another using DUO's MOAB 85F.

Not long after, we got bored chasing after the elusive aerial displays from these shy & weak barramundis and a friend spotted something which he suspects to be the not so humble abode of a grouper. Within minutes, a few of us were huddled around the area tossing in jigs, soft plastics, bait, and on several occasions instantaneously taken on the drop. Premature excitement ensues with opened hooks, lost jigs, lure, and snapped lines egged us further as I decide to use a madai jig with assist hooks instead.

Upon several jig drops sweeping the area gave me a shock as it was taken on the drop and actually felt like a snag. I immediately gave it a second tug and to my surprise, I was given a firm response tug. Then comes the frantic tug of war trying to lift the grouper out of its hole. It was a bruiser grouper but was no match for my Majorcraft Skyroad spinning rod.

Bruiser Grouper tips the scale at 3.8kg, I decide to pay for this bruiser for dinner. Photo courtesy of Tackle Source.

Bruiser grouper turns tasty grouper. Half the fish here takes up half the lazy susan.

Complete catch report can be found here courtesy of Tackle Source.

Fun for a day also meant that it's time for my reel's regular checks and service prior to my off shore trip 2 weeks after.

Bruiser grouper was no match for these tough gears still in excellent condition.

Same goes to the worm gear and floating shaft without signs of wear. Just the usual grease coat top up is enough.

Make sure to apply generous amount of grease on these bruiser beaters.

These are just the few critical ceramic bearings that takes most of the bruising. Seals removed, grease flushed, soaked in cleaning solvents, and elevated with wire mesh to keep it away from dirty sediments in a glass jar.

In goes the jar into an ultrasonic cleaner to thoroughly clean these ceramic bearings.

Oiled balls and grease rubbed body back into the reel.

These babies just need some tender loving speedy oil.

Speed oil for this fella too before plugging it back into the reel.

A well kept and also the proud feeling of a nicely pimped up reel gives me confidence in the field that I've eliminated another factor for failure to land fish. Till next time, Jarak, here I come!