Saving it for a rainy day

So here we are in July and for some reason the rainy season has only just properly showed up. Recently, some friends and I went to Srinakarin reservoir on a snakehead hunt only to find that the water levels are extremely low considering the time of the year. Usually by July, we would already be at the start of the fry-stalking season. Unfortunately, July 2014 has produced very little rain, leaving our snakeheads skulking in the deep, waiting for the water to rise enough to create good spawning conditions.

In my experience snakehead parents do not provide the best fight or weight. Because of its dedication to its young, the snakehead parent is usually very thin. The strongest of the snakeheads and the most fun to catch are the pre-spawning giant snakeheads. At first they are their usual neutral purplish colour, but as they start the nesting phase they become completely black with the exception of some white around their jaw. The purple and black phase of the giant snakehead is when they are their strongest and heaviest.

I suspected that the fishing wouldn’t get good until the rains hit and raised the water levels. And I was right. Our company arrived at Kaeng reservoir on the tenth day of endless sunshine. With us was our newest crew member, Angie from Iceland. Unfortunately for Angie, the sun was unrelenting and shone throughout the first half of the day, the only time she could fish since she had to go back to Bangkok to work.

Welcome to the squad, sorry about the weather

In the afternoon though, while Angie was sitting at a computer answering emails and corresponding with clients in the States, the rain made an appearance. Kris and I continued fishing and just like magic, the snakeheads started attacking things in the shallows near the sunken grass. All we had to do was accurately cast our lures into the busy areas and BOOM, one giant snakehead each.

I should mention that we caught them as a pair. These weren’t just two random snakeheads; they had actually coupled. I caught the male with a JD’s Custom Bait peep toad and Kris caught the female with a buzz bait.

On our last day, we could fish only the first half of the day since we had our regular non-fishing lives to return to, but we managed to get a couple of topwater hits.

One more for the road

It turned out to be a great trip — we brought in a new team member and were the proud catchers of the first snakeheads of the rainy season. Catch us again soon for the next trip.

Oz is a foodie, amateur chef and fishing extraordinaire. Check out an interview with him here, head over to his blog at http://ozbkk.wordpress.com/, follow him on Twitter @bangkokhooker and keep up to date with his fishing adventures at http://bangkokhooker-fishing.com/.