It pays to adjust your fishing method to the bait fish of the season, and seabass in autumn are hunting for protein rich chunky Conoshiro - a shad like fish some 20cm long.

To imitate them you have to cast fairly bulky streamers. I did give it a good several hours' effort but the fish weren't cooperative enough. The big minnow plug cast for a change did fetch a fine consolation prize though.

- Back

Next stage was Yokohama, some 30km south west. It is another giant city with lots of man made structures including the Bay bridge.

The game boat Seakuro knows the area inside out. You only have to sit back till Capt. Okamoto slows down the boat and points at the boil 15 yards in front of the gunnel.

Not known widely even among its 20 some millions residents, Tokyo has extensive canal networks in most of which seabass inhabit in good numbers. One such hot spot is the channel connecting Sumida river and Arakawa river right in Tokyo downtown. The canal forms a popular tourist circuits where small cruisers pass thru every 15minutes or so. And interestingly, every time a boat passes, it disturbs the bait fish, calling the predators up for the dinner table.

We managed to catch our fair share of snappers most of them we released alive.

Highlight of the day was top water game for mid sized blue runners. They were chasing baby sardines and working small poppers induced violent strikes.

Nov 5th we went out again in the boat Ｆｅｅd. The season had moved on with the air cooled down. Squids also had moved down deeper to seek their own creature comfort.

We cast squid jigs in rocky shorelines and it is mostly a sightfishing game. Very enjoyable on a sunny day.

They are intelligent creatures that quickly learn to ignore the artificial baits. Which makes the game even more fun.

The blue bowl of the Pacific teeming with great number of Mahis. As the season progresses you tend to have bigger number of smaller fish, but there still are occasional monsters mixed in.

I was lazy and did not re-rig the system, and sure enough, XXL Mahi easily broke the 60lb leader.

Replacing squids, breams and seabasses come closer to the shore, and it offers a variety to those of us popper lovers. I invited my father to join us for the day and he too managed some feisty breams.

Sept. 20. Wit the heat of summer slowly easing, we went for yet another exciting saltwater game - squid jigging. The young squids that were born in spring have grown to 10-15cms and they hunt small fish actively.

The next day was yet another fine day. We visited Katsurahama beach nearby - famous for its traditional garden like setting.

I managed to land handful of small to medium fish.
If casting a small fly on a lighter line, say, 8wt, you have greater control to selectively hit the big cruiser. But it usually requires big chunky fly to entice big fish, which in turn demands heavier line such as 500grain sink tip, harder to control - a trade off we have to live with.

Aug 15. Again down to Kohchi to enjoy the 2nd round of Mahi games of the year, in a game boat Hisyo.

The heat and humidity of southern Japan is almost tropical. The short few hours of relative coolness is soon to be dispelled by the rising sun.

Mid Nov, I went up to Tokyo to greet those metropolitan seabass.

The northern end of Tokyo bay was my first stage, casting to the feet of Rainbow bridge, one of Tokyo's landmark. My guide was Capt. Uchida, in a game boat Seahorse.

Aug 27, We chartered Feed boat again and went looking for some more snappers. They come to to real shallow shorelines in summer and we can catch them on lighter rigs.

Speeding under the twin bridges of Ondo.

Spinning no doubt enjoys a definite advantage in being able to cast accurately, and even from a limited casting space.

The best fish fell of course to Sayuri - 139cm beauty too heavy to be held up by herself.