KOTA TAMPAN REVISITED - Part one (Sebarau Fishing)

This article was published in the December 2003 issue of Rod and Line Fishing magazine.

Mention Kota Tampan to most folks and they will blink and give you the blank look. You cannot blame them as this small village, situated near the Perak River, just a few kilometers from Lenggong is considered a sleepy hollow.

This is the house that Datuk Sri Ong Kah Ting grew up.

Lately Kota Tampa seemed to be getting into the limelight quite often. A team of archeologists had uncovered a prehistoric settlement, and as a result a museum had been built nearby to keep all the artifacts. The other reason for its claim to fame is one of its illustrious sons, Datuk Seri Ong Kah Ting, was elected the president of the MCA. Surely this sleepy hollow will be expecting a lot of changes soon.

More than two decades ago, a few of my friends and I were exploring and fishing the Perak River area. The flow of the river been slowed down by the Chenderoh Dam further downstream was very conducive for fishing. The occasional big floods that occurred created quite a number of ponds (these were before the building of the few dams further up river, which alleviated the flooding problem). The flood water trapped in the valleys by the surrounding hills, and with it all kinds of fishes too. These were the ponds that we were fishing long ago.

This one grabbed James' Tail Dancer.

To access these ponds, we had to hire a sampan, row across to the other side of the river and then trekked to the ponds. I still remember on one of the trips where as always, I was given the task of rowing the sampan.

All my friends were teasing and telling me to row harder or else they would not provide me my meals. The most vocal of the lot was this guy who was a non-swimmer. He went on and on until I got fed up.

It shot out from under a log to grab the spinner bait.

Using my leg, I dislodged a piece of river clay used to patch up a hole in the sampan bottom (Kota Tampan sampans were famous for having holes on their bottoms those days. To prevent water from swarming in all one got to do was to dig up some river clay to patch up the holes).

Water was rushing in through the knuckle size hole fast. I stopped rowing (or rather downed tool to be more exact). You should see the panic look on his face. Even though he was pleading and begging, I stood firm. Only when he had meekly agreed to patch up the hole with his shirt, that I resumed rowing. Well, as they say, ‘revenge is sweet’.

Be very careful of these mengkuang leaves.

Actually we were rather foolhardy to trek into those areas, as army patrols around those areas were rather frequent. Being mistaken for terrorists and accidentally shot could not be ruled out. But when you were young, you always throw caution to the wind.

Goh Tiong Boo (an ex-classmate) and I decided to explore our former hunting ground again just for old time sake. James Wong was roped in to make up the crowd. With my boat, access to these ponds was a lot easier now. Many passages were cut from the river leading to these ponds allowing us to just slowly maneuver our way in. But still we got to be very careful inching in as the cuts from the mengkuang leaves were not unlike being cut by saws. We passed many overhanging branches and vines. I was pulling Goh’s leg about pythons and cobras dropping down from the overhanging jungles above (he is rather squeamish about those reptiles).

This fellow bit more than it could chew. Do you think it can swallow the balsa imitation?

At the first pond we moved very slowly as most part of the pond had water weeds growing just below the surface of the water. Drowned tree trunks were aplenty too. Shallow running lures were used to avoid frequent snagging.. Our luck was not so good here, for quite frequently while casting at one spot, the schooling sebaraus would frustrate us by surfacing at the other end. Maybe the water was too clear for we had many striped gladiators following our lures before veering off near the boat on a few occasions.

The sebaraus here are more colorful than their cousins from other areas.

At the second pond, our luck was better. James’ Tail Dancer was hit after only the second cast. Not too big, but still a good fight on light tackle. After releasing a few ‘tom thumbs’ we decided to move on to the third pond. Here too the small fellows were the more aggressive ones. A few more were caught and released before we decided to call it a day.

On our next trip, only James and I could make it. At one of the ponds, I noticed a ball of kuang fries among some sunken logs. James’ red spinner bait was grabbed the instance it was cranked pass the fries. When it was landed, instead of a kuang, the culprit as a sebarau. It must be eyeing those fries for some time.

My Shad Rap gave this small fellow an aching jaw.

Not to be outdone, my Shad Rap was hit too. Pulling up that sebarau, I was rather dumbfounded why that ‘ikan bilis’went for my Shad Rap. I doubt, it could get that piece of balsa wood pass its throat.

We headed to the next pond when there was no more action here. After we cut the engine, sebaraus rises could be seen intermittently. My Red Head was the first to connect on to a jungle perch, followed closely by James’ Tail Dancer.

I take my hat off to who ever invented this lure retriever.

 Between us we caught and released more than twenty sebaraus here. Tried though we did, we never encounter the elusive giant loner that we were always hopping for every fishing trip.

On a good day when everything clicked together here, a bountiful and fruitful harvest can be expected. One thing angler cannot leave home with is a lure retriever. The plentiful remains of drowned trees and bushes made sure that your investment for one is a must.