I moved to Thailand a couple weeks ago. For now I'm living on an island called Samui, which is around the same area as Phuket. I hit up a local "pay lake" here on Samui called TopCats. You may have seen it on the show River Monsters with Jeremy Wade. This lake ain't no Corona or Irvine. The fish in here are big and exotic. Most of them come from South America, but the climate here in Thailand is suitable for them. I had a good time fighting these fish. Me and one other guy were the only ones fishing that day.
Phenix Black Diamond 15-40 lb. Spinning Rod w/ Shimano Thunnus Ci4 8000:
I was using my Phenix Black Diamond rod. They're lighter and thinner than rods with the same specs. You'd actually think they were bass rods if it wasn't for the saltwater style rear ends. The owner and staff told me my rods wouldn't hold up... said they'd break on these fish. I told them these rods are deceiving and are very strong. They still were very skeptical:
Redtail Catfish:
Redtail Catfish:
Giant Siamese Carp:
Redtail Catfish:
Redtail Catfish:
Redtail Catfish:
Mekong Giant Catfish:
Mekong Giant Catfish:
Redtail Catfish:
Fighting a Redtail:
Redtail Catfish:
Arapaima:
Arapaima:
My total fish count was 8 redtail, a Mekong giant catfish, an arapaima, and a giant Siamese carp.
I REALLY wanted to catch an arapaima. The lake closes at 8:00pm and it was getting close to that time and I hadn't caught one. It was 7:50 when I threw my bait (a chunk of a local fish, not sure what it's called) near some brush in the water. At 7:55pm the line starts screaming off the reel. Set the hook and the fish made a loooong drag peeling run. After the initial run it was pretty easy getting him in, unlike the other fish I caught that day which kept ripping drag through the whole fight. I was pretty excited when I saw that it was an arapaima.
Anyway, it was a good time fishing there. These fish are definitely hungry because the action was pretty much non-stop, except for about a 2 hour period of time in the afternoon where I only got a couple bites and no takers.
All the fish were CPR'd and the guides at the lake even squirt iodine on the hook wound before releasing them so that it doesn't become infected.