Penang National Park Boat Trip (4/5)

As I mentioned in an earlier post, you are able charter a fishing boat and fish in the sea near the National Park so, early in the morning, I took a taxi from Georgetown and booked the boat. Having waited a while on the new jetty, I noticed something swimming in the surf. I thought it was a group of water monitors out at sea, but when I checked the photos when I got home later on, I found that they were otters.



Smooth-coated Otter - Lutrogale perspicillata

Waiting another half an hour a little boat came along and picked me up from the jetty and we were off. Although I did bring my proper fishing kit, the skipper's plan was to fish a handline so thats how we fished. Very simple, a heavy lead, very thick line and a fairly small hook. I baited it up with a bit of squid and lowered it down into the depths. Soon, there was some chattering on the end of the line and I tried to strike but nothing hung on to the hook. After several attempts, I brought a nice little Tripodfish into the boat.




Short-nosed Tripodfish - Triacanthus biaculeatus

After that, I had a puffers after puffer to the point where they became annoying, so we moved on to a little sheltered headland. It was a lovely spot with many eagles flying overhead. They even seem to be having better success with the fish than I did



Green Rough-backed Pufferfish - Lagocephalus lunaris




White-bellied Sea-Eagle - Haliaeetus leucogaster



White-bellied Sea-Eagle - Haliaeetus leucogaster

We actually anchored between two other boats but none of them seemed to be having any success but I persevered and landed my first new species of the day. It was a catfish which I later identified as a Yellow Sea Catfish [#123]. I was quite annoyed as the skipper who was quite concerned about me trying to handle the fish to the point where he seemed to almost crush the fish when he held it. I am aware of the dangers of catfish and where their spines are. [I even got pricked by one in Hong Kong a few blog posts back.] The fish seemed fine when we released it.



Yellow Sea Catfish - Arius venosus #123

A few casts later, I brought up another new species of fish. It was a Northern Whiting [#124] (Or Silver Sand Whiting or Silver Sillago, I'm using the Australian name for the species). I've caught King George and Sand Whiting back in Australia but I don't have any photos of them, so I was quite happy about photographing this species.



Northern Whiting - Sillago sihama #124



Northern Whiting - Sillago sihama

Didn't catch anything else after that but the skipper did bring up a Green-spotted Pufferfish.



Green-spotted Pufferfish - Tetraodon nigroviridis

I actually got quite seasick after this, so we sailed back into port. The plan after this was to fish the jetty until my prebooked taxi came to pick me up a few hours later. [see next post]