From Ty:

Nomad I went to the river and I arrived at 4:21. I caught a dink right off the bat, first cast. I then caught three nice ones that are in the pics. I heard this loud thunder and was thinking about that lightning show you sent me of that guy fishing. Oh well, I continued to fish until hearing the heavy rain come across the river and guess what? It was a mad dash sprint to the chain to get into the truck. You guess it, I was soaking wet. At that time it was only 5:15, so I did pretty good for less than an hour and catching four fish at 92 degree weather. I wished it didn’t rain because it could have been a good evening of fishing.

NEW TO FISHING IN KOREA??

If you answered YES to the question in the subject line, then read on.

We have members here from several different parts of the country from near the Seoul area, down to the very Southern parts and we get 5 -10 emails per week asking where to fish, how to fish and what to use.  Hopefully the following will answer some, if not all of the questions you may have.

SPECIES

Korea has multiple species of fish in both fresh and salt water.

Fresh water;
1. Bass
2. Bluegill
3. Snakehead
4. Crucian Carp (small)
5. Common and Mirror Carp (big)
6. Catfish
7. Various species of trout (mainly on the east coast, and in stocked pay ponds during the colder months.)
8. Freshwater Tarpon
9. Keuri, just to name a few of the most popular.

Salt water (mostly seasonal),
1. Sea bass
2. Flounder
3. Squid
4. Mackerel
5. Tuna

FISHING METHODS

Here on this site, we are mostly all bass fishermen chasing our quarry using artificial baits/lures. There are plenty of internet stores in Korea for buying fishing tackle, lures and baits. Or you can also order whatever you may need from the states. Just look at the list of tackle stores along the right hand side of this blog page. If ordering from one of the Korean sites, you will need the help of a Korean speaker to place an order as they have to input their Korean ID number etc. Also, all towns and cities have some kind of local fishing tackle stores and most of them sell a decent selection of all types of fishing equipment.  Whatever worked for you back home should work here just fine when it comes to the type equipment and lures, depending on what species you’ll be fishing for.  For example, for bass we use spinnerbaits, jigs, crankbaits, soft baits (worms, lizards etc), and finesse rigs like drop shot and shaky head rigs – all depending on water/weather conditions and what the fish will hit on that day.

Fly fishing is also a possible method here, however finding the equipment for this kind of fishing can be a little trickier, but possible.

PLACES TO FISH

If like us you are wanting catch bass, then just about any water around the country has bass in it, and if bass are present then bluegill are also usually present. The best way to find water near you is to use Google Earth or Google Maps to locate a river, stream or lake close to where you are, then go check it out.  Be aware that although there is no requirement to have a fishing license in Korea, some of the lakes do have people that come around to charge a “maintenance fee” which can range from 5,000 to 15,000 won PER DAY.  If you are asked to pay, you should also receive a ticket stub back indicating the date that you paid.

TIPS FOR FINDING BASS IN WATERS

If you find a nice looking lake, pond or river but you are not sure if there are any bass in there, first have a look around the shores of the water. Most bass anglers in Korea fish from the shore, and to be completely honest, they are not the tidiest or environmentally conscious of folks, and some of them leave their trash lying around the shores. This trash includes empty lure packets, hook packets etc. Also have a look in shoreline trees or overhead power cables for snagged lures.  If in doubt, then wet a line and find out the fun way.   

If after reading this you are still looking for help, please join our blog and feel free to ask any questions in the comments section of any post.

Tight lines!

Looks real bassy, doesn’t it?

Once again, Ty struck first while it was still dark out, catching a nice fish on an Ika.  I struck back with a green Bitsy Bug jig (thanks, Tex Mex).  That’s fish blood on the side of the boat…the fish was hooked through the tongue (or whatever it’s called) and was bleeding pretty good but swam off fine once I released it.  The fish in the third pic was caught on a regular, black Zoom U-tailed worm.  Then we both started catching a lot of dinks so we switched to jigs again and caught even more dinks …here are a few pics:

I’m learning the more I use jigs.  Patience, patience, patience.  I must have pitched that jig to the same spot near a submerged tree at least 7 or 8 times before that big bass took it and no one was more surprised than I was.  Another thing I’ve been learning and trying to improve on is the presentation, i.e. having the jig hit the water as softly and as quiet as possible.  It seems like if you can make that jig suddenly appear in front of the fish, you’re more likely to get a reaction bite, whereas a splash on the way in must spook the bass because with the exception of that big one, every one of the ones I caught today grabbed the jig on the first cast, as the jig was sinking, and when I had managed to make a nice, quiet presentation.  The more I fish jigs, the more I like it! Although it was short day, we had a great time and it felt really good to be out on the water again.  What made it even better was that we had cloud cover and a nice breeze most of the morning, and for a Saturday, there weren’t very many other fishermen out at all.  We saw Rob running up and down the river in his bass boat, and also ran into Mike, who was fishing with his friend, and also saw John out there (minus the wiener dog).  Aside from that, I think we only saw 3 or 4 other boats out today, which is rare for a weekend – although many Koreans are on vacation right now so maybe that had something to do with it.  All around, another nice and relaxing day and I can’t wait to do it again.

From Ty:

I fished this lake Tuesday evening and Wednesday evening. I caught 16 on Tuesday, but only had two nice ones. I caught 24 on Wednesday with four
being nice and worthy of a camera shot. The first two pics are bass from Tuesday evening, the other ones are from Wednesday.

We spent most of our time looking for and fishing areas like this; pretty much the same as our last trip out – rock walls with overhanging brush, areas with submerged or overhanging trees and also areas with thick vegetation/reeds.  You can see the green tint to the water from the algae that’s growing in the water which happens every summer.

These are the three biggest we caught this morning, and as you can see, Ty struck first shortly after we got to our first spot – with a well-placed senko at the end of a submerged tree.  And later, I caught a bass with one bad eye!  Once it got light and the sun started burning down on us, the bite slowed considerably but we still caught some dinks every now and then.  That’s when we discovered something – we were slowly drifting down a bank when I noticed that the water depth had changed from around 4 feet to 10, and we were only 4-5 feet from shore.  And since there were lots of reeds, weeds and some submerged trees, we both started flipping jigs right into the nastiest places we could.  And, we started catching fish!  Granted, all the ones we caught were small, but it was something new for the both of us and we spent the last 2 hours we had out there “jigging it.”  I told Ty that maybe the next time we go out, all I’m going to bring are jigs, just so I can learn how to fish them because that was a blast.  Now if we could only get a Big Momma on one   To end the day, Ty had to perform a little emergency surgery but that’ll be for another post, by another poster

I tried the big worms again this morning, and then the small worms but except for a few dinks, the fish had lockjaw so I switched to a spinnerbait and caught the above two.  I should have weighed the one in the second pic, that was a nice healthy fish and put up a good fight.  This will most likely be my last EMB outing for the next month or so; my wife and daughter are heading to the states next week to see family and friends – we have two dogs and I know there’s no way those two guys can hold it in for 12-13 hours so it’s either clean up dog pee every day or give up EMB.  Hard choice, actually

I started out with the Zoom Ol’ Monster worms again this morning but the bass didn’t want anything to do with them so I put on a 5”, black Zoom U-tail worm, weightless and started fishing that.  One thing I found out right away is that with a worm that size, you’ll catch dinks.  And I caught 9 or 10 out there this morning and some of the dinks I caught made the fish I’ve been calling dinks in other posts look like Moby Dick.  Seriously, I caught 2 or 3 that weren’t more than 3 inches long.  Fortunately, I also caught the 3 above, which made it a pretty good morning all around.  Now if I could just get some decent sunrises again!

Hey, I got cheated!  Right before I took that pic, the scale read 3.7!  I demand a recount!  LOL.  Anyway, we caught a lot of dinks today and I mean A LOT of dinks but among them, we also managed to catch a few nice bass as well.  Ty caught his on 4 and 5-inch, natural shad-colored Senkos, and I caught mine on…10.5” Zoom Ol’ Monster blackberry-colored worms.  Except for the one in the last pic, which was caught on a regular sized Zoom u-tail worm, also blackberry colored.  We also tried everything else in our bags; crankbaits, spinnerbaits, jigs, you name it but the bass weren’t having it although we did each have a hit on the jigs (probably dinks).  Oh, and I believe every single one of the fish we caught today came out of close and heavy cover like rock walls with thick brush, downed/submerged trees or heavy weeds.

And to show you that this blog is all about high tech, we now feature BassCam .  Basscam; it’s almost as good as being out on the water with us.  Yes sir, another great day out on the river – although we did find out that after 10 hours, my trolling motor battery starts losing steam.  We barely made it back to the boat ramp.

This morning I started with the 10.5” Zoom Ol’ Monster worms and caught a couple, missed a couple – they were on and came off the hook while I was reeling them in so I think someone needs to work on their hook-set .  Then I started alternating between a chatterbait and a spinnerbait; nothing on the chatterbait and one on the spinnerbait.  After that, I switched it up and put on a EWG 2/0 hook and put on a regular size Zoom U-tail worm, black-colored and caught a few on that.  It was tough fishing those worms weightless with that wind in my face and as you can see in a couple of those pics, that green algae stuff is getting pretty thick again as well.  I did a lot of walking back and forth this morning, trying to fish near rock piles, thinking that the bass would be sticking on the other side of the rocks, out of the current and that’s exactly where I caught most of my fish once the current started up.  This has been a pretty good week; one of the best that I can remember having this time of year but according to the weather reports, it’s not looking to good at all for the rest of the weekend so I’m not sure if we’ll be able to take the boat out or not – which is something I was really looking forward to.

I started out with the Zoom Ol’ Monster worms again.  I cast across the channel to a point on the other side, and before I could close the bail and start reeling, this fish had the worm in its mouth and almost tore the rod out of my hands.  That’s the way I like to start the day!  Once it started getting a bit lighter, I saw that the surface of the water was covered with the green algae stuff, so I thought “hey, how about a spinnerbait?”  So I kind of mixed it up out there today, Zoom Ol’ Monster and my trusty white/red spinnerbait.

It was quite the excellent morning again, all except for the fact that i lost 3 bass while using the spinnerbait.  One took me into the rocks and got tangled up; I could feel it tugging on the line and I sat there for about 10 minutes, hoping it would get free and swim out but in the end I had to break off .  The other two jumped and threw the lure and let me tell you, all that advice about keeping the rod tip low is for the birds because each time, I had the rod tip under the water, it was so low and they still jumped and threw the lure.  I don’t have an answer for that, not from shore, anyway.  I do have some KVD spinnerbaits which come with trailer hooks, but man, those things get snagged in the rocks pretty easy and they’re a little expensive to be donations to the river.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining about the lost fish (story of my life, right?); it was a great morning out there once again.  I’m not sure why the bass have been tearing it up out there this week, but I’ll take it as long as it lasts.