Natural Exotic Fishing Pond Rawang – Angry Fish

“Don’t move”

Just after the Chinese New Year holidays, Ben, Dron, Sek, Stefan and myself were hungry for some fishing. The location chosen is the Natural Exotic Fish Fishing Pond at Rawang.

With a bad fish itch, we arrived early – before dawn, in the rain, at the closed gate. So I called the owner, wished him Kong Hee Fatt Choy and told him we are at the gate!

The place have been closed the past four days due to the holidays so we are thinking the fish will be, like us, hungry. Turns out they are not just hungry, they are also angry!

Massacre In The Pond

Surface activities are all over the pond. At the section near to the row of aerators the scenes resemble bait balls and feeding frenzies. We can see fins sticking out of the water’s surface everywhere and in very close proximity. Once in awhile there will be commotions as larger fish go after the smaller ones and the odd jelawat launching itself completely out of the water.

Ben is the first to get lucky with an unstoppable fish while bait casting. Then Dron could not stop another take on his 8 weight. Stefan too, lost a big one after a long fight on his 9 weight that saw a lot of his backing out. Another busted line.

You may have noticed we are mostly fishing heavy gears today. Yet I myself experienced a couple of violent strikes on my 10 weight that resulted with me losing a few flies.

For a period of time, tense lines and screaming reels charged up the atmosphere. The fish are in no mood to choose lures, flies or bait. Almost everything that moved or resembled something edible was gobbled up. At one time I have trouble picking up my fly line to make casts as fish after fish will lunge at the fly.

The most caught species is the jelawat (sultan fish or mad barb) with a few decently big ones, too. I lost count of the number caught! Each of us landed at least a few pieces of jelawat alone.

Stefan (first time fishing here) could have hooked and lost the biggest fish of the day, looking at the manner it fought – either an amazon redtail or asian redtail, nevertheless he still ended with an epic pacu.

Stefan and his huge pacu on fly

A jelawat (Leptobarbus hoevenii) hooked on a surf candy fly

Parents must be extra careful when bringing kids to fishing places

The jelawat often take flies on the drop.

Jelawat or mad barb are great fun on appropriate tackle as they will make mad dashes in all directions when hooked. We notice an exceptional number of them this time around.

Bad Handling

Something the operator of the pond should look into is the way catches are handled. They appear to be lacking on this in comparison to previously where after using the landing net, fish are placed in those big blue containers for unhooking. This time around, many fish were placed on the gravel ground, trashing. This obviously causes unnecessary damage to the fish and increases the mortality rate.

Crowded

Not surprisingly, there was quite a crowd today but that did not bother us much as we all concluded it was a morning well spent, literally with tired arms!

The bites started to fizzle down, eventually, and it was time to take care of our hungry tummies instead. I did not keep count – but after four hours of fishing, easily ten to fifteen fish was landed by me alone (not counting those that got away). The rest of the guys did very well too. It was a good thing we got there early. I guess the early bird catches the fish!

An asian redtail catfish that went for the ever reliable woolly bugger fly. Looks like someone has a fish-on in the background, too!

“Fish-On!” The Natural Exotic Fishing Pond at Rawang is a great place to fly fish as the fish are generally huge and readily take flies.

Yet another jelawat

It always works to leave fish alone for a period of time. Let them get charged-up a bit which will result in happy days ahead for sport fishermen.

When did you last experience a frenzy like this out fishing? Let’s hear about it in the comment box below.