Fishing Surat Thani, Khanom, Hua Sai, Thung Song.

[ManInSurat]

I live in Surat as my username implies and I regularly go to Khanom, Hua Sai and Thung Song in Nakhon to visit in-laws and get in some fishing while I'm there as they're pretty much all avid fisherpeople - my wife included!

As Khanom is on the Gulf of Thailand I either rent out a longtail for the day with my brother in-law or alternatively I fish off the rocks at Khlong Note - near where the dolphin watching tours leave from (see photos below) It's really lovely there and you can see right across to Samui, even see the ferry pier on a clear day. Not many people realise but Khanom was the main ferry pier from the mainland to Samui up until about 15 years ago, before Don Sak was built. There's still very clear evidence of that there. We either take tents with us and sleep under the stars on the beach or hire one of the many bungalows dotted around the area. You can also get a 3 bedroom villa, right on the seafront, for 1,200 THB - which is right next to the now defunct ferry pier.

You can also see the Mu Koh Ang Thong National Marine Park, and if you get a nice local Thai fisherman guide, he can take you out to any of the tiny and numerous islands dotted all around the archipelago. For me Mu Koh Ang Thong is one of the best kept secrets and very much overshadowed by it's big brother Samui and little sister Pha Ngan sitting right next to it - thank heavens! It's my second favourite place in Thailand for paradise after Koh Rok/Koh Kradan/Koh Lipe on the Andaman in Krabi/Trang.

As I said above you can also rent out a longtail for dolphin spotting in the area and the trips are quite successful - common grey porpoises with black flecking. They bow-ride and look up at your from the water, that's amazing when they do that. They're such fantastically empathetic and intelligent animals that can take on a shark and win! I've heard stories of them protecting humans, herding a human in a pod they've formed to protect from sharks. Simply fantastic.

The thing I love about sea fishing here is that there such a wide variety of fish species. To name just some of the fish I have caught there - either boating or on rocks:

Bla Kang Baan - Oriental Sweet Lip, light brown or rusty colour with large black spot towards tail.

Bla Duk Talay - Saltwater Catfish (deep grey/green in colour and apparently have much stronger poison in their gill barbs - I didn't intend to test this out!)

Bla Salit Talay - A yellow and black striped saltwater gourami. Ubiquitous in the Andaman sea as well as in the Gulf of Thailand.

Bla Nok Geow - Parrot fish in a variety of colours.

Bla Nok Khow - Another type of sweetlip except these are silver

Bla Lang Keow - I don't know the English for this, but the name in Thai literally translates to green-backed fish.

Bla Lai Talay - Saltwater eels. Again a variety of colours.

Bla Siat Khao - Silver Dorado - not the long green variant more stout and obviously silver the one I caught was well over 7kgs.

Bla Oh - The very very ubiquitous mackerel, seen commonly in open air markets baked and about 30 baht per fish. I really can't stand them to eat, but they're very popular with the muslim community.

Bla Pak Pao - Globe/Puffer fish, which are always immediately thrown back. My brother in law really sees these as a hindrance to his fishing. They have a tendency to bite through line.

Bla Kra Baan - Saltwater rays and skates. Normally sand coloured, some deeper browns too and greys.

Bait for saltwater - I generally use live shrimp, kept with a machine-generated air supply in a cooler, when going for larger fish I'll tend to use squid, normally dead, sometimes live if we can keep them that long. We actually go out for the squid too the night before, which in itself is great fun, you should see the hooks (very odd looking) they use and the lighting rigs they have for that. I won't go into the process in detail here, but if you ever get offered the opportunity don't pass it up.

Also there's the option to catch smaller fish for live bait in the rock shallows, which you hook and cast or cut up if you fancy. I find Bla Lang Keow are the best for this and I generally use a 6 hook Sabiki Rig as you can get 6 fish on if you're lucky and these Lang Kiow are like mackerel. They'll go for anything, even just the bare hooks! Fish jumping onto your hooks really is funny sometimes.

I caught the majority of the different types in Khanom, and only really got dorado in Hua Sai.

There's more but these are all I can remember right now for saltwater.

In Thung Song, which is not dissimilar to Surat Thani really, we take a small oared channel boat, which is really good fun as we mainly go for Bla Chadoh - Giant Snakeheads and Bla Chon - Regular/Striped Snakeheads. Again we go and get the bait ourselves the night before, taking a torch out on my brother in-law's palm oil plantation and catching small frogs ourselves to use in a live bait rig, "spring-loaded" so as not to snag the hook on the vegetation. I also take along bright and dark frog lures, which I buy from my brilliant tackle shop in Surat and then back this up with all manner of insects which we catch ourselves, grasshoppers, juvenile roaches, crickets all work well.

N.B. Toads will not work. The fish really don't like them. I'm talking about the Ee-Ang toads, the one that make that racket at night after a rainy spell. They get their Thai name from the noise the make "eee, aaaang, eee, aaaang", haha! They're dark grey/green with a white chest.

The frogs you should use are called "dtua kiat" or "luuk kiat" they are not tree frogs, which are normally very bright, they're small ground dwelling frogs about the length of a pinkie.

The channel we go out on is really bank to bank stuffed with lotus plants and give the predatory fish great places to hide we find a nice spot and cast out over the plants and make the frogs jump reeling in at a steady and medium pace. Chon and Chadoh go for bait very quickly and you have to have your wits and reflexes about you to get one on. Your striking here has to be at its best. It's very exciting as you are basically hunting these and it's a battle of wits.

Chadoh's are the real prize, I've had a couple around 5-6kgs, but nothing mythical yet, which I think is mostly due to the fact that the channel is relatively small, so they never get to those sizes. I have seen pictures from people have gone out on Chiew Larn reservoir near Khao Sok and there's some real monsters in there. I'm dying to go one day.

One thing I will say for Chon/Chadoh, they're probably the most intelligent fish I have ever tried to catch. They're also extra sensitive to disturbances so try to approach them as noiselessly as possible. I really enjoy fishing for these.

Another way Thais catch Chadohs/Chons in these channels around plantations is an invention I've only ever seen in Thailand - a yore. They call the way of using this "york yore" which means to lift the yore. It's a massive pulley system, that has a large square net attatched to four poles that hang the net down into the water to the bottom. They are built on mini-piers that extend out into the canals about 10 meters. You lower the net into the water with a winch - which is on the bank, let some time pass and when you think fish have made their way above the net, you wind in the winch and quickly bring the net up, trapping any unsuspecting fish. Nowhere near as interesting as line fishing - but you can sit with your mates, having some drinks, making as much noise as you want and catch all manner of things.

Back in Surat Thani, the fishing is nowhere near as good unfortunately and all the tributaries of the Tapi River I have found to be quite poor for wild fish. There's pay for play places, but I've always liked wild fishing myself.

When I do fish, I generally catch:

Bla Duk

Bla Kayeng (dwarf catfish/mystus)

Bla Lai (black eel with red flecks)

Bla Gaa (carp family, generally black or very deep brown)

Bla Gote (silver catfish with a black spot on the dorsal fin - be warned their gill barbs have a strong poison in, I acidentally stabbed the webbing between my fingers with one and it really really hurt - for a while)

Bla Sawai

Bla Jiin (again another fish I don't know in English, but translates to Chinese Fish from Thai - they're quite large dark brown with red marks/fleckings, I suspect part of the gourami family)

Bla Selamet - (don't know English for this either, they're silver with a pink/red sheen, and average 0.5 to 2 kgs.

Bla Nin

Bla Tapien Khao/Deng (red-tailed tinfoil barb and the Javanese silver barb)

Bla Yee Sok - (the Isok barb)

Bla Siew - (Tiny rasbora, when over-the-shoulder net fishing - which I'm trying to learn!)

Bla Pak Pao - (the freshwater puffer)

and lastly large blue-armed fresh water crayfish - one of which I actually caught on a line with live shrimp - cannibalistic!

Bait-wise dead shrimp is a favourite, feeders with foam filled with the rice-flour/banana/oil mix, earthworms, ragworms (which I buy), insects, frogs, home made boilies, corn, bread.

As for what I'd really like to get my hands on. Well there's a company my brother in law knows in Ranong that will take you out shark fishing. What for, I don't exactly know. But the words, shark and fishing make me almost salivate. What a prospect! I'd like to go for the Mekong Giant obviously, the freshwater giant ray, Tarpon, Arapaimas, Alligator Gar, Mahseer and Marlin none of which you come across in my neck of the woods. Or so I believe/have been told. Maybe someone might know otherwise.

One thing I will say about Thailand is that it is utterly unbeatable for variety, such a rich and colourful abundance of fish, if you look in the right places.

If any of you make it down my way and want a guide, I'd be more than happy to help!

Here's some photos of me out in Khanom on a very unorganised spot of rock fishing. I have other photos on cameras somewhere that I'll have to dig out at some point so I can show some great catches.

Sorry some of the photos are so large!

The fish the Thai guy is holding is an Oriental Sweet Lip, the very unkempt farang is me (i'd had a few by the time this photo was taken - what's fishing without a beer or 17?!) and the location is Khlong Dote, Khanom on the Surat Thani/Nakhon province border. In the first picture you can actually see part of Samui in the background.

Edited September 7, 2010 by ManInSurat

[tole]

Thanks for sharing this

[BigFun]

Hi SuratMan,

Phangan here, sounds good that you are getting out and about and wetting a line, I wish I was on the mainland so I could do the same! I know of a few spots to go for the snakehead's not far from Surat,although I havent put them to the test, drop me a PM and I can tell you where. I would be grateful for any feedback as it is such a chore to get anywhere from here lol. My most common venue is Chew Lan but its not a cheap trip although it gets a little cheaper when there are higher numbers in the group. Good luck and thx for the post.

tight lines!!

[somchai jones]

Hi Man in Surat,

Great post, thanks for that.

Just wanted to ask - where/how do you get your live prawns?

I used to fish with live prawns when i lived in UK. They were easy to catch in the rockpools on the tidal beach wher i lived on the south coast.

They were a killer bait for sea bass!

Cheers

Edited November 3, 2010 by somchai jones

[MSingh]

Fabulous Post Fella, really enjoyed it..