Malaysian Payponds

Now, before anyone of you decides to wake up on a Sunday morning, grab your gear & rush to the nearest paypond for a 'lepas gian' A.K.A wet the lines session, I think reading this would help you better understand paypond fishing. I've been spending a lot of time & $$$, visiting most of the popular payponds in & around the Klang Valley. I'll share here some basic knowledge that anglers may find useful.

Survey & Recce

Just like wild fishing locations. I never go straight to a pond that I discovered & fish immediately. I seldom do that for some reasons. Now fishing at payponds can be costly. The objective of a paypond operator is to gain profit from anglers. Some operators are fair, some are cheaters & most don't know how to attract anglers & even some fail to keep their fishes alive. Gather intel! Yes, always check on the Internet, forums & any piece of information you could find about the fishability of a particular pond. There are hundreds of blogs, websites & forums to gain intel from, including FishHut.Blogspot.com! haha. Another way to gather intel is to actually make a visit to the pond first but not to fish but to what we Malaysians like to call, 'look look see see'. Most payponds have put up notice boards at their counters notifying various information pertaining to the rules, fees & what fishes to expect. I'll outline here what I normally check first at a pond.

Fishing Fees

Yes, without much reminding, any sane angler would first want to know how much the operator charges. Most of the ponds in Klang valley these days are moving towards the CnR (Catch and Release) model by charging a minimal fee of between RM 10 to 30 for longer duration of fishing hours but restricting size limit on fish keeping or even 100% release. In my opinion, if you are thinking of stocking your fridge with a weekly supply of fish by fishing at payponds, you would have better luck fishing at the wet market. CnR ponds have way better fishability than the old model of RM 15 / hour & etc. CnR ponds incur much lower operating costs simply because they don't have to replenish stocks too often. What we sports anglers want is to enjoy the process of angling ( catching fish with a rod & line ) & not to eat fish all the time. Besides, fishing is a form of relaxation & fun activity, you don't want to be stressed out even more by the RM 20 / hour pressure & going home without a single bite after 3 hours. 

Stocks

Any of you still going to a pond, rig a worm, toss it out & hoping you'll catch a fish? Sounds a little too optimistic right? Well, for beginners maybe. Most freshwater payponds in Malaysia stocks a similar variety of fishes. Namely, Red/Black Tilapia, Pacu, Patin, Lampam, Grass Carps, Rohu & Big Head Carps. These are commercially farm raised fishes that the pond operators could easily source for reliably. Different fishes have differing behaviors, feeds differently so we need to plan ahead what fish we would target. Which means what baits to use, what rigs & where is the best place to fish.

Cleanliness

How many of you want to spend hours next to a dump site? Anyone? Now perhaps feeding mosquitoes while waiting for a fish to bite? Ok, I guess not many. To be frank, I don't unless I'm doing wild fishing but that's a different story. A well managed paypond should be regularly cleaned, rubbish collected & plenty of garbage bins around the fishing area. This is not only good for the angler, it's good for the fishes too simply because we don't want to hook up plastic bags, tangling up rigs, left over fishing lines & accidentally step on rusted hooks. The fishes too don't want to swim in a dirty environment & catching all kinds of diseases. 

Baits & Rigs

Have you tried visiting a paypond armed with tried & tested baits with proven rigs then going home without a single bite? I'm sure most of us did. This happens because we've been using the wrong bait & rigs for the right pond. Always try to gain local knowledge. See & observe what the locals use as baits. See how they tie their rigs. Talking to the pond operator is a good way to start gathering intel. 

Rules & Regulations

It is better you check with the operator & have some basic understanding of the rules there. Every paypond has their own rules. Especially those ponds which promotes Jackpot competitions. Some usual rules are no treble hooks, fishes above a certain weight must be released, certain rigs like bomb hooks & float fishing is banned & etc. When we go fishing at payponds, we want all the advantage we can get but if we cheat then it's not sporting to do so.

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