Landing a Fish from a Pier or Jetty

Elevated places like piers and jetties make fishing very convenient and also gives an anger access to deeper waters without the need for distance casting to get to the fish. However, there is a considerable distance from the pier to the water, and many a time, a good fish is dropped back into the water for many reasons, like light poundage lines not withstanding the hauling of big fishes vertically onto the pier/jetty. As such, some gadgets such like flying gaffs and landing nets are very useful in landing that prized catch. Some of the gadgets commonly used by my buddies and other anglers are described in this section. Here we go.

Flying Gaff

Above: The Flying Gaff, note that the picture does not show the gaff pole being fully extended to it's capacity.

The picture above shows the flying gaff, after being set up. When gaffing fish, the pole helps to dispatch an accurate shot. Hauling up of the fish from piers and such is done using the rope and not the pole. In the next few pictures, the various parts of the flying gaff will be described and a rough guide to fabricating one will be discussed.

The gaff hook can be bought at most tackle shops, I bought mine from Born2Fish at Beach Road (23, Arab Street, Singapore 199722, Tel: +65 6295 1818, ask for Raymond). For the pole used for the flying gaff, some shops do help to customize the gaff poles and such, but in the case here, I DIY the gaff pole using materials commonly found in hardware shops. For the gaff pole, I used a telescopic 13ft pole used by painters. It cost less than S$12 from most hardware shops. The top 1 cm portion is sawn off, exposing the aluminum tubing underneath. A wooden sausage float is then trimmed to size and then inserted into the hole. A tight fit by virtue of friction will work, but if one wants to use epoxy glue to fasten the section of the float in place, it works too. Finally, a slot is cut to prevent the gaff hook from rotating freely when it has been fixed onto the pole.

In addition, do note that when storing the gaff hook, make sure that the sharp end is not exposed, i.e. by covering it with rubber tubing, so as to prevent accidental injury to yourself or others.

Landing Net

Next, we have a landing net, this is meant for cases where scaly fish is encountered, meaning that the fishes are hard to gaff. The Barramundi is an example. Also, when one wants to prevent injury to a fish, the landing net can be put to good use also. The next 2 pictures shows how my landing net for use at piers/jetties is fabricated. This is an easy one to DIY!

What is shown above is what my buddies and I use to land big fishes from elevated places like piers/jetties. Hopefully, this page will be of help to anglers who are wondering how on earth fishes like Stingrays in excess of 50kgs are hauled up onto a pier from the water surface.