24/09/2024
Gooing back through some old papers and I found this from Piotr Piskorski Pro Fishing , he wrote it after one of our first trips to Guinea Bissau , excellent group of guys in that SALMO LURES GROUP . Great read written by a world class angler .
GUINEA BISSAU - SILVER SIDE OF THE BLACK LAND
When I came back from this expedition in the end of March, there was snow lying outside and bitter, freezing wind was raging. But it was enough that I closed my eyes for a second and I was back there again. Hot but fresh breeze from the ocean, and the noise of rolling waves and wild howling of the reel's drag are still making my body creep. Yes- it was undoubtedly one of the most interesting fishing experiences in my life!
I had been encouraged for over two years to set off by Richard Sheard- famous english fishing guide and owner of a World Sport Fishing travel company(www.worldsportfishing.com). Here is a fragment of one of his letters from 2008- 'Dear Peter- you must visit Guinea!!! We are catching Jacks in hundreds, Snappers, Cobias, Leerfish and more barracudas then you've ever seen in your life! 18 various species on cranks!!!' Is any better encouragement needed? I was only waiting to prepare couple of prototypes of saltwater lures to check them 'on the spot'. In the middle of 2009 decision was made- we are going! I successfully gathered a group of 12 people to ensure occupation of full staff of a camping built for french anglers on small island in Bijagós archipelago, about 100 km from the shore of Bissau Guinea. There were friends among them- anglers from Germany, Latvia and Poland. This international company quickly were to their liking despite pretty different temperaments and characters. Up to the degree that some evening conversations lasted till dawn! Despite of this everyone was ready for breakfast on time to challenge again with the atlantic monsters.
The Republic of Guinea-Bissau- Repùblica da Guiné-Bissau –
is a country in western Africa and over Atlantic Ocean. It borders on Senegal and Guinea. The neighbouring coastal islands also belong to Guinea Bissau, and the largest of them are gathered in Bijagós archipelago. This is where 'our' mini-island Acunda lies, sized about 250x200m.
In medievial times the territories of today's Guinea Bissau were known as Gabu kingdom, that was a part of Mali Empire. The Empire partly survived until XVIII th Century. Guinea Bissau Coast and the neighbouring islands were one of the first lands colonised by Europeans. Portuguese people reached there as early as in 1446. In the XVIIth Century these lands became the center of lively slave trade. The lands were colonised by the Portuguese until the rebellion in 1961 and final approval if independence on 10th of September 1974. After period of Revolution Committee, civil war and a number of overturns led by the military, Guinea Bissau became a multiparty republic with President as a head of the country. Unstable political situation and location did not positively affect wealth of this country. It is one of the poorest countries of the world, supported by International Monetary Fund. There is no industry and the economy is based on agriculture and fishery. As a result, 1.5 mln of Guinea Bissau population lives in poverty which does not stand out.
To be honest, we expected views of collapsing shanties and lean children begging for a piece of bread, while we actually saw quite good houses and colorful dressed , laughing faces more interested in crack of shutter of our cameras rather than the content of our backpacks.
Luckily, doubts concerning safety did not confirm, too. One can find a lot of warnings about this place as a tour destination on the Internet. The fact that it is one of the transfer canals of drugs from South America to Europe is a rather irrecusable one. Despite this, or maybe thanks to this, it is in no one's business to bother tourists and to fuss around. Nowhere, even for a moment we did not feel danger and the native looked very friendly to us. Of course, we did not sight see the country and, in the capital- Bissau, we had a guide. There is nothing to do there, anyway. After short night in a hotel we loaded our luggage onto boats and set off to an island placed around 120 km from the land.
Fishing camp
in Acuda island comprises of 6 two - bed lodge with running water and toilet included. As a matter of fact an electric ventilator serves as an air conditioning, though, but it is not a significant inconvenience. Despite high temperatures ( 25-37 Celcius degrees a day) thanks to fresh breeze endlessly blowing from the ocean it wasn't difficult to stand it with no bigger problems. Good mood was also influenced by excellent staff with delicious meals, tidying up and washing our clothes every day. While in the evening guests were served by a bar, well equipped in cold drinks. Every morning, after breakfast we set off for fishing, of course. We had 4 large boats at our service, 200 KM on each at disposal. Crew of each boat was composed of 3 anglers, captain, and 'deckie' or the captain's help. In our boat it was Max and Mata- both pitch black.
It has to be said, that boys did their best to ensure anglers have no other problems than only arm ache related to fighting huge fish. In the middle of a day at anchor or on charming beach we would take lunch . It always consisted of sashimi of small (3-5 kg) jack and a meat course prepared by the kitchen . Accompanied by cold drinks, as preferred. After short break and bath in warm ocean we used to move on to battle again. We usually went back to the camp just before twilight. I never heard anyone complain about coming back too early.
In fact, high temperature and physical effort caused that, around 6.30 o'clock all that everyone was thinking of was a bottle of well cooled beer and a warm dinner. After the dinner some, tired of the thrillsf the day were quickly going to bed, while others continued fishing, at the bar this time. Most of the times with excellent results! Though we knew there are perfect was great fishing from the camps beach no one tried , I think they had , had enough in the day
Bijagós archipelago consists of 78 islands, 20 of which is populated by about 5000 indigenous people. These waters are very fertile, which is visible at a first glance. In the zone where we were fishing the water had not perfect transparency- usually it was around one meter. It was associated with strong currents both from the coast ( two big rivers) and with currents pushing two huge water masses between archipelago islands. Of course further from the shore we found places where a lure was visible at several meters.
Of course, as the result of high water fertility, there was enormous number and diversity of fish species. We happily agreed at the beginning for Richard's suggestion of organising a competition of the biggest fish and the biggest number of species caught during our turn. As a consequence the most species- 21, caught by Myself and Jurgen Haase – the owner of Think Big company. It has to be stressed that it is not unusual record. Anglers from previous turns fishing on natural lures ( pieces of fish, shrimps) reached
40 different fish species!
This gives a picture of how interesting, and exciting angling in Bijagós Archipelago can be.
Whereas the biggest fish was caught by Jacek. It was a tarpon of about 100 kg weight! Everything was clear here- this is one of the biggest ever caught by camp guests. There is not so many places in the world, where tarpons are successfully caught on artificial lures. Atlantic Coast near Senegal and Guinea is famous for tarpons not because of their abundance, but because of high average weights that they reach. There is not many takes, but most of the caught ones reach over 60 kg. Taking into account well known difficulties with tarpon's strikes, fishing on artificial lures would not be effective. Therefore they are caught on life baitfish, using extremely precise 'clues' of migration paths of the silver colossus.
Of course it was of equal importance as precise positioning of a boat and choosing proper tide and time of the day to use a suitable tackle and technique. No doubt, the best spot for tarpons in this area was traced by the natives long time ago. It resembled a huge, sandy reef, with a boat placed on the more shallow side, so as the live baitfish swam over the bottom fault. The best moment of tide was when depth in this place was equal to 3 to 6 metres, with a very strong current. Tarpons' takes used to begin 2 hours before twilight. Live baitfish around 15 cm long were put on enormous, forged hooks with a characteristic point of a hook bended inside. Colorful baloons served as floats. During one evening, we had a dozen of takes on two boats, three of which were successfully struck. Two tarpons, after slow fighting combined with spectacular jumps and several dozen stand offs, were taken right into the boat. They were Romek's fish- around 60 kg mass and Jack's- around 100 kg. Maciek was less lucky. His tarpon was lost close to the boat.
Using live baitfish, we were also fishing for cobias, several species of snappers and, so called, otolites. In these cases, though, it was necessary to add heavier weight to a live fish and present it close to the bottom. These were the areas of wrecks of old ships or volcanic reefs covering ocean's bottom in many places. It has to be admitted that our guides knew their job top class. They placed the boats exactly where needed and, usually, takes were beginning quite quickly. It happened not once in this situation that all the crew run fishing amok! Fish were taking crazy and at some moments the captain and the deckie had to move to work despite us! Only in such situations it was clear how many fish flow somewhere there between volcanic rocks of Bijagos!
Generally, beside fishing on baits (including fishing from the beach), several techniques on lures are used this way. Such lures were, of course, preferred by all members of our expedition. However, it was worth trying all native ways at least to understand better customs of native fish. So all species were allowed to be caught on spinning, but sometimes it required different place, boat positioning, or just the change of the lure.
For deep, a dozen metres holes with strong currents the, so called, 'butterfly jigs' turned out to be the best. It is an interesting modification of sea pilk with a hook ( or two) mounted on independent, short leaders. Such a lure's set of hooks adds a lot of vigour and mobility, especially during downfall to the bottom. Richard showed to us a couple techniques of such vertical fishing. It is something similar to icefishing, but a lure is much bigger- just 300-400 g. And longer rod's jerks - such as 1.5- 2 metres! Can you believe that with such jigging gentle 'sniffs' used to take place? All one had to do in such situation was without stopping jerking, pull the lure very quickly several metres up. Huge, lazy snappers were changing into deadly torpedos, and had no problem catching up with pilks. And then you just had to stop them from returning to their holes in the rocks. In similar places with weaker current we also managed fishing using vertical cranks Salmo Giant Chubby.
Second, more popular method is of course-
Trolling
Nothing unusual about it - three cranks over the stern, rods placed in rod holders, boat swimming over 6-12 m depth, sun is shining and you sit and sip cold beer and stare at wobbling rodtip. The basic difference to what we know from the trolling on our waters is the speed that boat makes. It always oscillated between 8 to 10 mph or around 15 to 20 km/h.
With some disbelief I was listening to Richard's story, that it happens not so rarely that on a lure presented in such a way take big Cubera snappers- such ones as of 25 to 50 kg mass! Such a snapper looks like an old, good-natured carp. Nothing more wrong, this is a predator with mouth full of teeth. And in addition to that fast as hell. I experienced this myself, when a one of such kind attacked my Whitefish with metal lip.
We were swimming over a reef, 11 m deep when my rod bent till its grip and the brake howled like angle grinder. No way there was a snag. At the beginning I managed to drag the fish away from its hiding place. After five minutes of fighting on the edge of tackle power the monster got tired with playing- came back to the bottom and soon it was all over. Richard, who was standing beside me had no doubt- that was cubera snaper. Other fish, which could have so much power fight different way- most of all in the deep. Let's imagine what happened. Crank was moving at the depth of about 8 metres with 15 to 18 km/h speed. The fish set off from its hiding place in a rock cave and attacked the lure. So it had to instantly move 3 metres upwards!
Our main trolling trophy were barracudas, though. The captains had several routes, on which taking of this sea pike was just a matter of several minutes of swimming. Barracuda’s fight is not one of the most dramatic ones. The most often fish of 100 to 150 cm length and about 10 to 15 kg but on this tackle they didn't have 'much to say'. Fights accompanied with their beautiful jumps finished quite quickly. Crews of our boats thought of barracudas as 'special care fish'. Exaggerated, in my opinion, threat from their teeth caused that before they at last decided to touch the fish, they numbed it with a big, wooden stick. Only after that they were unhooking the lure. I can't forget for long the wide smile on Mata's face, when beating next barracuda at its head was saying 'aspirin!'.
As a result, a lot of this species were sentenced to death. They landed under the board, and then to the neighboring villages as gifts or goods exchanged for fruit and bread. Of course, we tried barracuda's meat cooked several ways and we have to admit that it is very tasty. The majority of other species' fish we caught went back to water, though.
As trolling lures we used cranks- mainly the typical ones for this technique Whitefish SX with metal steer, 13 and 18 cm long. According to as Richard had ensured, in terms of abundance of takes there were no others like them. Unfortunately, after the farthest take of toothed monster – the fourth, the crank was, at its best, ready for total repair. Fortunately their reliable construction allowed successful finish of the fight even despite total demolition of the lure. Multiple contact with frightening barracuda's mouth is manageable only by cranks fully made of hard plastic. The biggest barracuda during our expedition was caught by Tomek. It was 164 cm.
Apart from barracudas, there were other species available, too. I can't forget one trolling session beside a place called 'chimneys'. It is a very famous spot placed not far from a huge wreck of once a cereal transporting ship. It lies several dozen metres deep and there are only two, chimneys resembling - elements of its construction sticking from the water. Ocean currents built shallow reefs from sand around it. The wreck has length of over 200 metres, so it is an attraction for both fish and anglers. It lies far from Acuda island, though, so it is not often visited.
We didn't have especially good takes of predators, that day. We only managed to catch several fish on spinning, so we decided to try trolling around the wreck. First quarter brought no fish, though. So I took the rod into my hand and pulling up and releasing the crank I tried to make its work a little bit more attractive. The first attack took place exactly at the side of the first 'chimney'. It was a beautiful, black-golden tiger jack with a mass of about 10 kg. Next a come back and second drive across the wreck. Almost in the same place a hit! The fight was longer this time. It is a leerfish- the only one I caught. Most beautiful- a silver - grey torpedo with salmon - like head. It weights about 20 kg and our captain gladly poses with it for a camera. It is said that it's quite rare. Max sets the boat and we pull the cranks the same route. Take almost tears out the rod from my hand!
First run was a good 50 metres long! Then tiring pumping with the rod and more runs. After 15 minutes both me and the fish were all exhausted. This time it's a nice jack crevalle. I give the lucky Whitefish 18, purple mackerel colour one to Jacek. I use blue mackerel myself. We are swimming around the wreck again and I open a can trying to take some rest for a moment. At the side of the 'chimney' I intuitively move the rod twice. An aggressive jerk makes me spill my beer on myself. No mercy - the fight must be stand up again. After next 5 minutes in 5 metres- transparent water we can see the shape of a big barracuda. It doesn't like my plans too much, so the fight towards the boat takes some time. No doubt it senses the famous Mata 'aspirin' waiting for it here! This is the next time in the last hour when I am testing durability of my rod. The barracuda escapes from under the boat, and I, resisting with my foot against the board, am trying to prevent it. I am really pulling as hard as I can! The crack of breaking carbon is sobering. Half of the rod broken on SPIGOT slides on the line and now I have to fight with the fish using lower section only. After next 5 minutes we have it near the board.
Max applies 'an aspirin' and a moment after the barracuda is in the boat. We take some pictures and measure it - 154 cm!
So trolling was very efficient but a little bit boring, too. My companions, as one man, are dyed in the wool spinners. It was impossible to convince them to testing cranks and jerkbaits. Everyone agreed that only-
Classic spinning
Allowed a real check of one's fishing qualities.
With the spinning method, we fished places of the largest fish groupings, or the surroundings of 1 to 3 m deep reefs. We were using floating or suspending cranks or jerkbaits, 10 to 18 cm long. We were using rather big lures - 15 to 18 cm. Smaller ones were immediately attacked, but by small fish. Pace and the technique of presenting the lures did not significantly affect the number of takes. The most efficient was usually aggressive action of a lure and fast pace of retrieve.
Most often, the takes almost tore the rod from a hand. Then it was necessary to prevent the fish from runing back to its hiding place in the rocks. Usually it was impossible, so it was wiser to count on fishing luck. Especially snappers were good at such tactics. While the most interesting was that you could never be sure what fish attacked the lure. Jurgen, for example, using Salmo Sweeper in his next four casts caught 4 fish- each of a different species! They were red snaper, cubera, jack and pompano!
Expectations of fishing adventures were high from the very beginning. Flame was skillfully added by Richard before the expedition. I have to admit that no one was disappointed! The hottest emotions accompanied fishing for jacks. Several species of them live there and they hunt in shoals composed of several hundreds of individual fish of similar size. They were usually fish of 10 to 15 kg mass. The most interesting and the most exciting was fishing for jacks on surface lures. Jack is an absolute devil in fish form! In a fraction of a second it can reach the speed of a fast motorboat and change swimming direction without slowing down!
After the first fights we understood the strange Richard's smile when he was asking if anyone fought with jack before. Of the whole group there was only me who could pride oneself on such experience. I wasn't prepared for such a fight at that time, so it lasted no more than adozen of seconds. During this time the fish took 120 m of 50 Lbs braid and swam far away leaving me with a dumb face and strong decision about revenge. This time everyone of us had over 300 m of line on our reels, so this kind of situations would not happen. No doubt it is just fishing for jacks from the surface what is worth experiencing in Guinea, even if nothing else would happen. A Big Popper or a stickbait is draged on the surface fast or very fast. The best spots for jacks are surroundings of reefs and sandy shoals on currents confluences. In many of such places even despite of the weak winds, conflicting masses of water were creating several- metres long waves which, in turn, by whirling were creating foamed welter. One of the best spots got a name 'washing machine'.
Takes from the surface were very aggressive and spectacular. Despite using very strong tackle and 25 kg line we didn't win all the duels! Usually the direct reason of every failure wasn't due to great mass and strength of the fish. Excellent, japan braid Toray unfortunately didn't endure the contact with sharp edges of rocks at the bottom. Often it was a 2- 3 metres long leader made of one - milimeter fluorocarbon line that was saving us from losing the loot. Unfortunately, sometimes it turned out to be too short.
Usually in the first seconds of fight fish were pulling, without a problem, over 50 m of line. If a reef was close ( and often was), all one could do was to count on fluke. Tightening the brake and strong fight was of no help. Some fierce 'monsters' neither did let to be dragged to a boat, nor even let be seen! Everyone, who tried to use his 'normal' tackle soon got the idea that there was no exaggeration in Richard's stories about the power of the local fish. A number of broken rods happened, staightened trebles and split rings as well. Despite this, in the port smiling faces were seen every day and the stories about exciting adventure of the last day could be heard.
Other wonderfully beautiful fish of Bissau is-
Pompano
French gave this fish a name of a clown with the characteristic, sad face, painted white. Pompano after being taken out of water looks like a giant, pearly conch, shining with guanine in all colours of the rainbow. First fish of this species I caught in the neighbourhood of the 'chimneys' on Warrior Crank Salmo crank, discovering slightly by an accident a suprisingly effective technique. Big fish was following the crank to the boat's board and it looked like the fish didn't manage to catch it. It didn't hide in the deep, though, but went back making an impression that it's looking both sides for a would - be prey. So I threw the lure 2 metres from the boat's board. The fish followed instantly, but did not attack.
So I began the classic 'figure eight' or wide eight with a the tip of my rod half covered under water. This is a technique well known to all hunters for american pikes 'muskie', which very often follow a lure to a boat. They are neither scared of the angler, nor the boat and often only after a number of eights, as if tired of stubborn circling of their prey they decide to attack. This simple technique turned out to be reliable in case of pampano. As I spotted later, if rod tip and a lure move under water in one plain, the fish can follow them for a long time and not that rarely finally gives up on the attack. On the other hand, if towards the end of next 'figure of eight' the lure 'ran away' to the surface - the attack was immediate.
Of course, right after that, it was necessary to firmly stand on both feet, because pampano was running away quick as lightning, making little of full tightened brake. I told my collegues about my discovery and everyone successfully used 'the eight' at the sight of a pompano appearing close to a boat. It led to a situation that when one of our boats met a shoal of these fish, my colleagues were barely casting but circling eights near the board! Every now and again some of them started up making a fighting shout heralding the beginning of a new fight. We joined them and this was quite a crazy play!
A week of fishing at the surroundings of Acunda island passed as quick as a thought and soon we thanked to Richard for the invitation and the whole camp staff for a warm service. Saying goodbye on the airport in Lisbon everyone agreed about one thing- it is worth coming back to Guinea again!
Piotr Piskorski
THE MOST INTERESTING FISH , WHICH WE CAUGHT IN BIJAGOS ARCHIPELAGO
Barracuda- there are five species of this fish on Bissau territory. We were fishing for, so called, giant barracuda (Sphyraena barracuda). It can reach length of 2.5 metres and mass of 50 kg. Cases of attacks on scuba - divers and swimming people were noted.
Cobia - (Rachycentron canadum) – can reach length of 1.8 metres and mass of 70 kg.
Otolite - Captain Fish (Otolithes Dux)- reaches up to 120 cm and about 70 kg mass.
Jack - we were fishing for several species of Jack and even our hosts had problems with differentiating between all the species. In my opinion they were:
Jack Crevalle - (Caranx hippos)- reaches up to 125 cm long and 32 kg mass
Horse-eye Jack - ( Caranx Latus)- reaches up to 1 m and 20 kg mass
Tiger Jack - (Caranx Sexfasciatus)- reaches up to 1 m and 15 kg
Red Snapper – (Lutjanus campechanus) – can reach up to the mass of 18 kg
Cubera Snapper - (Lutjanus cyanopterus) - reaches mass of 150 kg
Tarpon – (Megalops atlanticus)- reaches length of 250 cm and mass of 160 kg
Pompano – (Trachinotus falcatus) -reaches length of 120 cm and mass of 25 kg
Leerfish- – (Lichia amia)- can reach length of 2 m and mass of 25 kg
