The quest for sailfish, rompin style

by Jarrod Day on 20 Oct 2013 It was back in 2005 when I first heard of the phenomenon that surrounded Kuala Rompin’s sailfish fishery. Each year, stories emerged from the small fishing town in North East Malaysia of epic proportions of sailfish that migrate to the South China Sea before the monsoonal season annually.

Last season, I had heard about a group of anglers that ventured to this part of the world and on their return wrote social media sites that on numerous occasions when they were tracing sails to the boat, they could see a further 20-30 free swimmers. How can you take information like that seriously, the old saying 'it was this big' maybe untrue on some occasions, but this, I had to see it with my own eyes to believe it.

A year later, my time had come, flights booked with a few mates and we had set off on our journey to hopefully experience a small taste of what everyone else was talking about.

What seemed like packing for a four week assault, I had everything at the ready? Surface poppers, stickbaits, skirted lures, jigs, soft plastics, hooks and leader and a fly outfit just to cover all bases. Having not known exactly on the procedure in which the locals target these majestic beauties, I thought it was best to have everything at my disposal for when the time came.

We landed in Singapore before enduring the 5 hour bus ride to Kuala Rompin. I guess I should have had a re-think of gear at this stage of the trip as having to lug all the gear thorough Immigration and customs into Malaysia wasn’t the easiest of tasks in 38 degree and 90 percent humidity levels.

Having arrived at out accommodation late that night, a quick rigging session of all the gear before hitting the sack was mandatory.

We awoke the next morning to a calm but overcast day. The sea was flat, resembling a mirror. We headed out offshore and came to an abrupt halt at the sight of a dozen blue and white coloured floats bobbing up and down on the waters surface. The bait grounds, a series of floats attached to a length of banana leaf wrapped rope which had been anchored to the seafloor. The locals make these fads to attract baitfish that they can collect before hitting the sailfish grounds. Having caught a solid 20 or 30 live baits consisting of yakka’s, squid and mackerel, we headed off keen to get tight to a sail.

Some 60nm off the mouth of the River, we came into view of an uninhabited Island. With no life on the way out, all of a sudden thousands of birds were flying above. Frigate birds cruised almost weightless in the air currents while below, flocks of terns erratically swooped the water surface trying to pick up any baitfish that came too close to the waters surface. Out of the corner of my eye, a black fin emerged from the surface then all but disappeared leaving a small ripple of white foam. A sail, I called out and in the distance some 10 meters away, a free jumping sailfish burst out of the water, high tailing it across the calm water. In awe of such a sight, we motored on.

Groups of maybe fifty to a hundred birds flying erratically in an attempt to devour what scraps they could. On further notice, the birds all seemed to be flying in the one direction and with that, we motored as fast as we could to get in front of them before switching off the engine only to drift as they came within casting range.

Within seconds, a lone sail emerged from the surface as the fish swiped at a shoal of anchovies. This was it, with rod in hand, a pitched a livie in the exact direction of the sail. The livie splashed on the surface and before I could gather my thoughts, I felt tug through the braid. Bail arm still open, I ripped off a meter or so of line, flipped back the bail arm pointing the rods tip in the direction of where the fish was and began to wind at high speed. As the line came tight, I slowly lifted the rod tip skyward causing the hook to set. With that, an energetic sailfish burst from the water surface doing a rear entry as it splashed a few meters from us. Within seconds, I was watching the braid diminish on the spool and I the blink of an eye, I was glaring with wide eyes at the blue coloured backing only a few wraps of braid down.

I gave the drag knob a few extra clicks to add more pressure which drew a blank as the fish continued to power on.
Rice, our skipper backed down some 100 meters so I could compose and get some line back onto the spool. By this time, the fish had drawn to an end and it was a matter of using the rods strength to coax it towards the boat. The energetic fish wasn’t done just yet and took another blistering run but still nothing like the initial hook up moments before.

Sticking to it, I found myself in a comfortable rhythm and by the time the fish was boat side, Rice had the leader and had the fish under control.

ROMPIN TACKLE
There is never enough information about the finer things of fishing when it comes to travelling to another country. Prior searching to find out how the locals go about their techniques used for targeting a specific species is extremely difficult.
Heading to Malaysia on the other hand, I was blessed to have been given the tip off from fishing adventure organiser David Noble from Oceanblue Fishing Adventures of through whom I booked the trip.

Having a little insight as to what we were doing, I had gathered all the gear that I though I’d use. When embarking on a trip so far from home, you don’t want to leave anything behind. Sure, I had packed all the necessities for live baiting sailfish but what if they were on the surface and taking poppers or stick baits, even a fly.

Yep, I had it all on the 'just in case' basis but as I found out, sometimes, we anglers to take way too much when travelling abroad.

The fishery at Rompin is unexplainable except for the fact there are literally hundreds of thousands of sailfish so be prepared.

Without going overboard you can get away with only taking a little bit of gear but it is imperative you do have the right stuff.

Rod choice is crucial due to the sheer weight of the sailfish and while the majority of fish you encounter might range 20-30kg’s, when they get side on to the boat, coaxing them within leader distance requires a rod with a substantial amount of deadlift.

Ideally, a rod rated PE 3-5 is more than enough to deal with them, I used a Wilson XOS Blade n Tails which never missed a beat the entire week.

Reels also need to able to support a high drag pressure and line capacity but you don’t have to look for the biggest on the market either.

Providing your chosen reel can hold at least 300m of 30lb braid you’ll have no problems. Shimano’s Stradic 5000 or 6000 is more than substantial but if you have a higher budget, take along a Biomaster or Stella 5000. With four of us fishing I use a Stella 5000, Tony used a Twinpower 6000, Brendan, a Stella 5000 and Karl loaded up with a Baitrunner 4500b which again had no problems against the sails. His fights just took a little longer due to the lower supporting drag pressures that we had in our reels.

The one thing about sailfish I found out, there is a limit in trying to go as light in the tackle department as you can before being dusted. After losing fish to 60lb leader, I stuck to 80lb fluorocarbon. Unfortunately, even when using circle hooks, the fish tend to be hooked inside the mouth rather than in the jaw hinge. When they head shake and thrust, the leader rubs on their rough lips in which lighter leader can be worn through easily.

Hooks are also a big talking point when it comes to targeting sailfish and it is this point that you get right.
Undoubtedly, circle hooks are highly recommended for easy release of the fish and to eliminate any hook damage other than around the mouth region.

There are many brands of circles on the market and knowing which one will work for you becomes a difficult decision. After the success of our trip and from research that I have read, Eagle Claw’s E2004EL 7/0 and Black Magic’s KL 6/0 are two hooks that come highly recommended.

There are also a lot of other items in which you must take along with you. It always pays to have a lighter rod to catch bait with. Either a 6’6' soft plastic rod or a rod similar to that of the Zerek 'Light Jerker' PE1-3 which was ideal for bait gathering and light jigging. You’ll also need swivels, spare leader both for the sailfish and bait catching, sabiki rigs and of course a lot of balloons, around 100 in fact.

Lure fishing for sails opens a whole new pall park with stick baits, poppers and fly fishing all proven methods. In saying that, stick baiting and popping is extremely challenging and quite often there a lot of casts between fish. That’s not to say the fish won’t take a popper or sticky but this is one style of fishing that requires dedication and persistence to be successful. During the four days we were fishing for sails, we dabbled in flicking a popper about. With so many fish free swimming, the main purpose for the use of the popper was to attract the fish to our immediate location to where out live baits were set. Overall, we had two follows from sails which veered away once the popper neared the boat and although it was a challenging task we were more content with hooking the fish on livies than tossing lures.

Part 2 to be continued next week...