Sometimes it can be almost too easy

Yesterday night my target was Burbot. It’s mostly night active species so decided to go fishing after a workday. The population of Burbot has collapsed in the last ten years so it’s not so easy species to catch nowadays....or so I thought.

There they are. Under five minutes, two Burbot

I was on the ice little bit over seven and started to fish at 7.15pm. Two minutes later I was unhooking my first Burbot. Couple of minutes more and Burbot number two came up. Was this suppose to be hard job? It took under ten minutes to catch third fish.

I tried for a half an hour more. I did not caught anything else so I decided to leave back home.

Burbot was my species number 12 for the year. So one of the harder species is now off the counts. That’s the way to go.

Tour of Central America, part 2

After an eight hours traveling at the bus plus spending two or three hours in the lines at the border we finally came to the Panama. First thing to do after we arrived to the city of David was picking up our rental car. We drove directly to the nearby mountain village which is the hometown of Grasse.

The next  few days we spend at the village and at the mountains around it. The landscapes were spectaculars. There was a very beautiful little river flowing down from the mountains. All I knew that there’s  at least some Rainbow Trout swimming at the river. Somehow I still managed to miss my chances to fish there.

Beautiful mountain river. So, what else there could swim than stocked Rainbows?

The next step was moving to the mighty Panama City. Almost first thing to do was a visit at the Panama Canal (You just CAN’T visit Panama without seeing that canal). After the excursion to the canal we spend the rest of the day walking around the Casco Viejo (Old Town of Panama City). There would be much much more to tell about the Panama City and it’s attractions but because this was suppose to be an fishing blog I will skip all that stuff…..

At 22nd of February 2011 it was finally time for a little fishing. We were heading to the Isla Taboga, a smallish island just outside Panama City. And because it was an island I figured out that there’s probably some water around. So I packed my fishing stuff with me.

After the ferry arrived to the island almost everybody onboard were heading to the beach to swim and sunbathe. Except one person, I was heading couple of hundred meters further with my backpack full of fishing tackle. I spend about two hours at the starting place. I didn’t caught a thing, there was only one small Barracuda following my lure and few Pufferfish which I didn’t hook properly.

Isla Taboga. At the right edge of the picture was my fishing spot.

I moved to the other side of the peninsula and spotted right away some dark fishes swimming near shoreline. I started with my whip rod and soon I hooked a fish. There it was again, a brown Damselfish which are very hard to identify. I shooted about ten pictures from the fish and after that I sliced it for a bait.

Another unidentified Damselfish. This one had a hint of blue colour at the edges of the fins.

I shooted about ten pictures from the fish and after that I sliced it for a bait. I cast out my bottom rig with a piece of damselfish on the hook and it took about an minute to have my first run.  It was a small Catfish. Clearly it was different species than the one I caught from Costa Rica. I took the photos and quick released the fish. Another cast to the same spot, another minute of waiting and another Catfish was landed.

This is unidentified too. He's definitely different species than his Costa Rican cousin.

After those catfish it was time to head back to the pier because the ferry was leaving soon. Isla Taboga was very beautiful island and I think that there would be much bigger potential as a fishing place too.

At the last day of our tour we decided to head to Avenida Amador. It’s a long causeway between Panama City and  islands of Naos, Perico and Flamenco. I had few hours to spend fishing so I did so.

There was lot of fish swimming between rocks right next to shore. I pick up that old and faithful Shimano travel whip rod again and soon my first fish was caught. I think it was some kind of Sergeant fish (still unidentified).
After couple of more Sergeants I finally caught something different looking. After the hours of inspections at home I’m pretty sure that the fish was juvenile Yellow Snapper. I also lost few Pufferfishes again. There’s something wrong at them. They are greedy bastards but they always come off from the hook when they brake the surface. I also saw many big Porcupine fishes cruising near the shore line but they totally ignored my bait. There also was few Eagle Rays gliding by and they did ignore my baits too (and I’m really glad about that, they're lenght was at least one meter).

Some kind of Sergeant fish?

A juvenile Yellow Snapper, I think.

That’s all from Central America this time. Some day I will come back and then it will be pure fishing trip….

This pal was almost as lazy as I am.

Tour of Central America, part 1

It was February 2011 when I travelled to Costa Rica with my friends Esa and Sinikka. My other friends Mikko and his wife Grasse were already waiting for us at the airport of San José. Grasse is Panamian and has lived at Costa Rica for years, so we had an excellent local guide with us.
None of these friends are not interested about fish or fishing at all, so this was not a “real” fishing trip.
After a good night sleep at a small village of Escazú nearby San José, we headed to one of the most popular areas of the Costa Rica, Arenal and the famous volcano. At the first day we went to nice, refreshing hike to the Arenal volcano (it was 35 degrees at the shadows, so the hike was everything else than refreshing). However the area and the landscapes are awesome, so it’s worthwhile to visit Arenal.

Right at the feet of volcano is a Lake Arenal, a lake where I had reserved a one day fishing trip with Captain Ron (www.arenalfishing.com). The lake holds a good variety of fish species from which the Guapote Bass and Machaca are the most popular gamefishes.

Captain Ron with his boat.

It had been raining for weeks and the water level was really high. So, the expectations were not so high what it came for fishing.
So, I hopped in to Ron’s bassboat and after a short ride with a boat I started to cast towards the shoreline.  It was cast after cast without any interest by the fish until I changed to a small buzzbait. Almost immediately I had my first bite, and soon another one, and another one. The only problem was hooking the fish. On a one short piece of shoreline I had at least ten bites, but I didn’t caught one fish.

It was under an hour to go, when Ron noticed a pray chasing fish in the middle of the weedbeds. It was the first cast when I got a bite, and yes, finally I hook the fish and my first Costa Rican fish was reality. It was a Macabi Tetra or Machaca in Spanish.

The Macabi Tetra (Machaca). Notice the Arenal Volcano on the background.

Right after my fishing trip we headed to the Pacific coast, to the lovely beach called Samara. We found an cheap and not so fancy accommodation (but hey, there was a bed and that was all I needed) for the next couple of nights.
Next day we spend few hours for sunbathing and swimming at the Playa Samara and at the afternoon we were on our way to the nearby beach called Playa Carrillo. There was a nice looking bit of a rocky shore at the end of the beach so I took my chances to go fishing.

It didn’t took too long to catch the fish with my travel whip rod and with small bit of Berkley Power Bait worm. It was some kind of Damselfish. It was brown, like many of the Damselfish species, so they’re almost impossible to identify. I caught couple of more of those and that was all from there. There was a big, yellow Pufferfish cruising back and forth of the shoreline but it ignored my bait every time I tried to cast for it. We left the beach after one of the nicest sunsets I’ve ever seen (The main picture of this blog has been taken from there).

Unidentified, brown damselfish.

At February 15th it was time to move on again. We decided to take the shortcut over the Gulf of Nicoya with an car ferry. We arrived to the pier of Puerto Naranjo quite early so there was couple of hours to do something while waiting the ferry. And what do you think I did. Oh yes, I went fishing.

Again, it took about minute or so to catch first fishes. It took me days after the trip to identify those fish and my final conclusion was that they were juvenile Gray Grunts. I tied an bottom rig to my spinning gear and used one of the grunts as a bait.

A Juvenile Grey Grunt

Soon my baitrunner reel was giving signs from a bite. I stroke and fish was on. It was not a hard fight because the fish was not so big. It was a brown catfish which is still unidentified.

Greedy and unidentified sea catfish.

The Longjaw Leatherjacket...

After the catfish I caught couple of more fishes with a whip rod. They were Leatherjackets and what was the best thing they were different species of Leatherjacket too. A common Leatherjacket (Oligoplites saurus) and a Longjaw leatherjacket (Oligoplites altus). It’s important to photograph every single fish you catch, if you’re not 100% sure what species they are. Those Leatherjackets looked all the same when I caught them but from the pictures I identified them later as different species.

...and the Leatherjacket

Before the ferry arrived I spend the last fifteen minutes spinning. I had two nice hits by Barracudas but they didn’t hit my spoon properly. So, no barracudas for me yet.

That’s all from Costa Rica. Part two is coming soon………Panama, here we come.

A picture of a creature we met later that afternoon.

There's (almost) nothing new under my sun

There haven't happened much since my last blog update. I made couple of icefishing trips about a week ago but results were crappy. Couple of small Zander, Roach and Perch were all I cought.
Yeah, and of course my firsts White Bream of the year.

Small White Bream with mormuska.