wazatherfisherman

Many years ago, my mate Ross and I were having a beer at our "local" tackle shop, "The Fisherman's Friend" at Yagoona, as the swell had been really big for a few days and we couldn't go rock fishing. The shop was on Liverpool Road and outside of clearway times, there was plenty of parking straight outside. A guy pulled up with a 13 ft aluminium boat and came into the shop to buy some feather lures for Kingfish and we started discussing the favourite lures we all used. We pointed out a few of the "new" Christmas Tree trolling lures and a few others on the wall, but the guy then said "I just want plain white feathers- I've been getting a boatload of fish on them every morning- come and have a look in the boat" It was a small "sit-down" boat only marginally bigger than Ross's 12 ft car-topper and there were Kingfish literally all over the floor. He said there were genuinely acres of them and they were in the entrance to Port Hacking and all along the front of Jibbon Bombora, been there for two weeks he said. Some mornings, they were in almost to Bundeena. They were easy to get, you just had to troll the outskirts of the schools, which were clearly visible, pretty much right on the surface. He'd been using plain white feather lures with either 2 or 4 oz heads, but added that if the fish followed the feathers without striking, there was a simple trick that was working really well. You needed to take an octopus around 15-18 inches long with you and cut the legs off it. Then you just needed to add a single leg of the Octopus to the lure's hook (which was a 7/0 or 8/0 Stainless "O'shauhgnessy" pattern- a Mustad 34007). The hook was just pushed through the leg once, leaving both hook exposed and leg free to "wiggle"- this turned out to be vital information. After seeing all his fish and getting the info, we asked the guy if he thought the 12 footer would be big enough to go out in, he said yes you're only fishing the entrance really. Our mate who owned the shop agreed we should be OK, so we went up to the fish shop and bought 2 octopus and organised to go the next morning. We were going to meet this guy (who's name I can't remember) at Bundeena Wharf and go out together. As we were meeting at Bundeena, we decided to just drop the boat in off the wharf. Early next morning, we drove through the National Park and down to Bundeena arriving well before light and we carried the boat, motor, fuel tank and very minimal gear down onto the wharf. Fishing gear was just 2 Butterworth "Jig King Deluxe" rods- 6 ft 20 lb jig/troll rods, mine with a Penn "Jigmaster" overhead and Ross had a Shakespeare overhead, both with 20 lb mono. A small tackle box with feather lures and a few Christmas Trees, 7/0 and 8/0 trolling hooks, a few swivels and some 50 lb Weiss Perlon for leader. Plus the octopus. We had forgotten the anchor and rope, only remembering while unloading at Bundeena, however as trolling was the plan, we thought we'd be able to do without it. Gear loaded, rods rigged by the light on the wharf and we waited for the other guy to turn up. After waiting until well into the morning light, we decided to have a bit of a troll around where we were, keeping an eye out for the guy, who was by now getting close to an hour late. He didn't turn up, so we decided to head out towards the ocean without him. As we got to the entrance to the port, we could see literally hundreds of Mutton birds just sitting on the water only a couple of hundred yards out, no sign of any fish though. There was still a big southerly groundswell rolling in, but the swells, although large, were smooth and a fair distance apart, so we thought we'd brave it and off we went. The things you do when you're young. At first, we stayed within a couple of hundred yards of the entrance, trolling up and over the big swell- no problem, quite comfortable actually. After trolling around for more than half an hour and not sighting the "acres" of fish, we went just a little further out and finally got a double hook up on kings and as they came boat-side, were followed by a few more. Got them in the boat, but after taking the hooks out and trolling around again, no more action, so we thought we'd try the octopus leg trick. Octopus leg added to each lure and off we go again, but still no visible schools on the surface. After about another half hour we were thinking about going in- at least we had one each, trouble was, it was the week before Christmas and although we normally caught plenty of fish each week, due to the swell being up, neither of us had any in the freezers and we both had big family gatherings and fish were "expected" by the relatives, to take home. Then we spotted something large up on the surface about 50 yards away and went over to investigate. Turned out to be a really massive Turtle just up on the surface, however, in the shadow cast from the Turtle, were masses and masses of Kingfish, all jostling for position in the shadow. We dropped the lures over complete with octopus legs and watched as the fish came straight over to investigate. We were amazed that although there were heaps of them and they seemed interested, at first, no takers. We then dropped the baited lures just out of sight and they started "nibbling" -super soft bites on the powerful troll rods. We tried all sorts of different approaches, including raising the lures into sight to see if it was the kings biting or something else, then all of a sudden they just switched on and swallowed everything including the lure and leg bait. It was easy fishing for a while, then all of a sudden they were gone. We started trolling again and spotted the Turtle about 50 yards away again, so went to see if the Kings were in the shadow. They were, and this time we only had to drop the baited lures over about 6-8 ft under the surface and they literally climbed over each other to be first on the bait. There were no bag limits (or size limits on kings then) and we caught heaps before the fuel tank got seriously empty and we had to take off. As we were heading down the face of a decent swell right in the entrance, all of a sudden the entire ocean was suddenly alive with the kings, there genuinely were acres of them. Whether it was the stage of the tide that brought them up to the surface or not I'll never know, but they were in the tens of thousands I reckon. If we hadn't seen the Turtle and found that first school, we would have gone back in and not seen what still remains to be the biggest aggregation of Kings I've ever seen.

Hi JoshGTV I did the same with calamari soaking in milk and garlic, left it uncovered in the fridge and the next day everything smelled like the garlic

Good story Jim- when did they get rid of Lugano St wharf? What a pity, it was a great spot

Thanks Rebel, will do

That's a great tip! By the way, there are plenty of foxes around up here of a night time too, some are pretty big. Saw one down the bay with a rat in it''s mouth, so there is something that goes for the rats other than cats

Hi Dieter where I'm living in Croydon, my mate here has 2 ponds in the backyard. One is a 12 ft aluminium boat sunk into the ground and he's got large fish (goldfish but big ones) in it. Over the last year, they have been slowly "disappearing" to the rat population, as have the large freshwater yabbies he has in an old sunken bath tub on the opposite side of the yard. The biggest yabbie was nearly a foot long and lived during daylight hours in a piece of pipe in the tub. Even with chicken wire strung tightly over the top and fastened down every couple of inches, the rats attacked the big yabbie head on and chewed off the ends of his nippers, which were pretty big and then got him a few nights later. It's almost unbelievable they managed to do it, being over 2 ft deep and up the back of the tub. I had a mate at school who used to sneak under Flanagan's and spear Luderick and the odd Bream. It was certainly a popular eatery, as was the Chinese restaurant that was there after. Have plenty of rat stories, but the rats are almost always the winners!

Hi Pete it's amazing what they can break into. I have a mate who breeds birds and they got into one of his "impenetrable" aviary's and ate all the new born birds. On close inspection of the colour-bond structure, we found scratch marks where they had bent the wall in order to get under the wire mesh- you wouldn't think they could do it but they managed

Hi Bolts1 years ago, when the Hairtail were thick along Stockton Wall, people had been catching tons of them (literally!) and the beach-side of the wall was absolutely littered with both bones and tons of rubbish just left there by uncaring fishers. We had stopped to visit a friend while on the way to Yamba for a 2 week fishing trip and knowing we loved our Hairtail fishing, he suggested we go and have a look at the wall- not fishing, just walked out to the end and back, which is a fair walk. Couldn't believe how many rats we saw on that wall, breakwalls like that are just rats paradise!

Hi Neil, we all used to "live" for fishing, back in the day before responsibility, age and health started catching up with us. Sadly , I'm only a one finger typist, so these take a few hours to put on, hence some of the "posting times" being way into the early morning. Glad to do it as long as anyone's enjoying the stories- I think it's good to escape to past times at the moment. Regards Waza

Hi Noelm the rats living down the bay at Fivedock have got more game over time and will steal bait in plain sight now

As many who fish the Sydney rocks already know, most of our spots have plenty of rats scurrying around after dark. Unless they're fighting or mating, they are pretty quiet and often when you think you saw something move after darkness has fallen, it's a rat. No noise, they sneak around and you often second guess yourself as to whether you saw something or not. They are natural "opportunists" and quick to get into anything that resembles a meal. Our first experience with them was on my third "official" fishing club outing, which was to "Jolong" ledge past the pistol range on Cape Banks. The plan had been to fish from dusk to mid evening, then stay at one of the guy's places locally and return to fish the dawn. When the evening session had ended, the rest of the party left to stay at one of the other guy's homes, leaving just the 3 of us on the cliff top to organise our gear for the 15 or so minute walk back to the car. Problem- Norm, the driver, couldn't find his car keys. We did have two torches, but the batteries were just about dead, and we couldn't find the keys anywhere, so we had to stay there for the night. Norm was in his twenties, my mate Fraser and I about 14. To say we were really ill prepared to stay the night was an understatement. It was autumn, blowing a westerly and genuinely cold. We'd already eaten our food and only had the clothes on our backs- nothing extra, no light bar the almost run-dry torches, no insect repellent and no shelter. Norm had a small "space blanket" which he rolled up in, leaving Fraser and I only our backpacks, a garbage bag each and about half of a Herald" newspaper to use for warmth. We'd left our bait- about 5 or 6 lbs of half frozen Garfish and some now defrosted Pilchards about 15 feet away on a ledge, so that as they defrosted, the juice would run off and not turn the bait to mush, after all, we'd be first there to fish the dawn now whether we liked it or not. After finally getting to sleep somewhere around midnight, we were all woken by a squealing, shrieking noise, followed by multiple noises of the sound of creatures fighting close by. I'd never heard rats fighting before, they make a lot of noise and it was obvious there were more than just a couple of them. Too cold to go and check on the bait, we just stayed in our garbage bags and newspaper until falling back to sleep sometime later in the night. Almost forgot to add- the mosquito's were thick and we all ended up being 'blitzed" by them too. Around half an hour or so before dawn, the other members returned and woke us up and we tried to get ourselves moving to go for a fish. When we went to grab the bait, there wasn't a thing left, blasted rats had eaten or dragged off the whole lot. The guys who'd returned shared their bait so we could at least have a fish. My total catch for the trip was 2 Tailor and 1 Trevally and to be honest, it almost put me off "rock fishing" for good. Then we started fishing at the Matten's below the big cliffs at Dover Heights a short time later and some 45 years ago, due to the difficulty getting down, we often stayed overnight. As you needed a decent amount of food for overnight trips, rolls and sandwiches were the go, a packet of biscuits and a few "Space Food Sticks" along with the mandatory 2 litres of weak cordial, made up the food kit for the summer months. We used to make camp in the "cave" which was just a wind eroded corner, set back about 40 yards back from the water and up about 40 feet above sea level, well underneath the cliffs and protected from most wind bar a Northeaster. It had a long, perfectly flat section that was great for sitting on or lying on to give your back a rest, but as it was about 250 yards from our main night fishing spot, all our gear was left unattended while we were off fishing. First couple of trips, the rats got into the food while we fished and we went hungry for the trip, even the Space Food in thick foil-like wrappers had been got to. We tried things like suspending the food bags about 3 feet off the ground, hung by fishing line from above, didn't work, the buggers would just slide down the line, tear or eat an opening and then it was a "free for all". Leaving a torch on, putting insect repellent on the bags and even leaving it in the old "Tupperware" boxes didn't work either, as they'd get into them, by biting holes in them or simply getting the lid off. Clever buggers. One night, after a longer than usual session, we went up to the cave for a feed, a break and just to get the wet rock plates off. For those who've never worn them, plates get uncomfortable due to your feet being soft from being wet and even 2 pairs of innersoles weren't enough to make you forget the flat heads on the bolts underneath. As we approached the cave, where a gas lantern had been left on in an attempt to ward off the main pack, rats took off in all directions as we clattered our way back- there's no "stealth" approach wearing noisy cleats. The approach to the cave was only accessible from the direction we were coming and all the rats bar three, had managed to get to a long undercut section where they could escape. The three remaining went in the other direction, where a small tunnel-like wind eroded hole went inwards off the cliff wall and in there they went. The hole went inwards about 4 or 5 feet with a slight raised section about 3 foot in- this is where the rats went. In the torch light we could see the three of them, but no amount of prodding inwards with the rod butt's could actually touch them. Better check the food! Only one of the four backpack's had been ransacked, but they hadn't been able to get the Tupperware box open and the food still intact. What to do about the 3 rats in the hole? It was decided to try and smoke them out, so we scrounged around and found enough stuff to burn, things always fell from the cliff above and we lit a fire in the mouth of the hole and pushed it in a few inches. We then armed ourselves with rock plates, PVC float tubes and knives, intending to put paid to the rats for good. After about 5 minutes of smoke going into the hole, we started running out of wood, so a plastic bag, followed by another added to the thick smoke filling the hole. As the smoke thickened we had to move back a few yards as it was really toxic black smoke from the plastic burning and we temporarily abandoned guarding the entrance, so as to breath ourselves.. We all agreed that nothing could survive in the hole, not in that acrid, thick, dreadful smoke cloud, so revenge was ours. Not so. First, as the smoke started to clear from the entrance, a rat appeared, looked at us and then ran and did a "suicide" leap off the steep wall in the other direction to us. It was roughly 30 feet down to the ledge below and it hit with a thump and rolled over the next ledge and dropped into a pool, a wave washed over the ledge and the rat disappeared in the darkness. About a minute later, rat number two comes out, looks toward us and decides to do exactly what the first rat did, "suicide" jumping over the edge, thumping down below and rolling off into the pool, to again be claimed by a swell coming over the ledge. Rat three was much larger and appeared at the entrance to the hole, but on seeing rat two jump and the smoke nearly cleared, decided to go back in the hole again. More plastic sourced, this time an empty 2 litre bottle was added to the plastic bags and we soon had another thick smoke cloud filling the hole. Didn't have to wait long after the flames were out and rat three reappeared. After looking at the cliff, the cheeky bugger ran straight at us and jumped on a tiny wind-grooved ledge that went right past the four of us at about chest height. Everybody had a "weapon" in each hand, so everyone had two goes at donging the rat and we all missed, even though he was only two feet from each attacker! After missing him with my left hand rock plate, I swear he jumped backwards to miss the blow with the right hand, then jumped the next attacker and the next and then had to go back the other way again- upwards to safety and he did it. That ledge was later nick-named "Rat's Highway" We decided to eat just about all the food, and as we already had a good bag of fish, stayed up at the cave for a few hours, before going back out to fish around 3 AM some three hours or so from when we'd first stopped fishing around midnight. Fished through until about 10 AM and then gutted and scaled the catch and were getting ready to leave by about lunchtime, when another mate, Wayne, came down. He was going to stay the night and tried in vain to convince one of us to stay another night, but after about 26 hours on the rocks, and it was also a Sunday afternoon, nobody was interested. Wayne had come well prepared for the night and had brought what we considered a "luxury"- a sleeping bag- which was something just too bulky and heavy for cliff fishing, besides, we were going down there to fish not sleep. We told him of the rats the night before and warned him not to leave any food anywhere with the gear while he fished that night, he'd be better off taking his food out to the fishing ledge, just to keep it safe. We said our good-byes and started the journey back. Wayne usually spun with big metals, casting them to the "horizon" with his 13 ft rod and Seascape reel until it was dark, then he fished for Bream or Tailor for a couple of hours before going back to the cave and crashing out for a few hours. Heeding our warning re rats at the cave, he decided to go and camp up on the next level above the cave, which involved climbing another 20 odd feet up via a short, permanent rope attached to a peg. Up on that ledge, it was quite open and although still under the cliff face, there were not really any protected spots for rats to hide. Although Wayne worked in a big tackle shop in the city, he'd never owned a decent torch, but had finally bought a good quality small torch, which included a spare globe and even spare batteries. After setting himself up on the high ledge, well away from the rats below, he got in his sleeping bag and keeping his torch close, lay down to have a snooze. While lying up there quietly, after a short time, the rat noises started up. As he was using his pack as a pillow and his remaining food was in the pack, he wasn't too worried about them getting the food- more concerned that they might have a go at him while he slept. He lay there listening to them squeaking away, quite close he thought. So best strategy was to put insect repellent on, close up the sleeping bag hood and crash out. He finally got to sleep, but woke in fright- something moved INSIDE his sleeping bag! He struggled to get the zipper down, but scrambled out and grabbed his pack and started belting the daylights out of the lump, visible in the moonlight, in the sleeping bag! The old 'H" framed backpack, with it's hard aluminium frame, made a great weapon and the daring rat lay motionless in the bag. After waiting a couple of minutes and now wide awake from the cold night air, Wayne poked and prodded at the now much smaller lump in the bag. No movement at all this time and no rat noise anywhere to be heard. Phew! Got the bugger! He then gingerly opened the sleeping bag right up to get rid of the rat- he could turn the bag inside out if there wasn't too much mess. Imagine his surprise when there in the moonlight was his new torch, smashed to bits in the sleeping bag- it, as it turned out, had been the "rat" and rolled against him in the bag.

Grandparents had a permanent on-site van at Windang and Grandma bought an aluminium boat that was just left chained to a tree next to the van. Used to go from Sydney every second weekend and fished with a cork hand-line from about age 4 or 5. Joined a fishing club at age 14 and started climbing down the cliffs of the eastern suburbs, where fishing really opened up with heaps of species available and no crowds. The passion has only grown

Hi JonD is that a gemmie or king barracuda? Can''t get to storage shed to retrieve any photo's currently

Hi Dieter I've caught Jew at both Pinta Bay (always try to have at least one big live something out on those houseboat trips!) and at the bit of reef on the last corner on the right as you go up about 150-200 metres out off the sandbank up the end of Jerusalem, where the really big school of big eels was. There are often Port Jackson's there as well, but haven't caught a Jew when the Eels are around- I don't think anything is nearby the eels when they're schooled up, so to answer the question, yes right location but maybe not right time

Hi SaltyGreek yep, don't unhook one, hooks aren't expensive!

Hi JamoDamo years ago, one of my mates caught a fair sized one while fishing with a hand-line next to the boat ramp at Berowra one night. There is a restaurant close by and four guys that had left the restaurant came over to have a look as he dragged the eel up the boat ramp. They said "you're very lucky, this is good to eat"- his reply was he didn't want it and they were welcome to it if they wanted it. One of the guys went looking for a plastic bag to put it in and it was lowered into the bag and the line cut. Next thing, the eel goes nuts in the bag and breaks out, landing on the road at the top of the ramp. To cut a long story short, between the 5 of them, they couldn't stop it making it back down the ramp and into the water, where it escaped. It was just too agro!

Hi Pete my advice re Pike Eels is to leave them well alone, they genuinely try to bite you and once you've seen those teeth and angry disposition, that's easy!

Hi Dieter glad you enjoyed it. On the fog, one of our later houseboat trips, again with the half cabin brought along, 3 of us had left the "mother-ship" and gone off searching for the fish, when the fog "dropped" really low, really quickly. We had been sounding Smiths Creek and decided we'd better go back to the houseboat which was moored this time in Waratah Bay- didn't want another "lost in the fog" night. At the upstream entrance to Smiths Creek there is a sign that says Bobbin Head with a directional arrow, we cruised along really slowly and the half cab's owner spotted the sign and as we passed it, on our left side, pointed the boat in the direction we knew Waratah was. Despite protests that we should stay along the shore which was only barely visible, the boat was driven out into the thick fog and we just crawled along at walking pace for about 15 minutes. All of a sudden, the driver said "told you we were going the right way, there's the next sign to Bobbin Head"- I started laughing and the other 2 on board asked what was so funny? There is only ONE sign- we had just done a perfect circle in the fog for 15 minutes and ended up almost exactly where we started from. The driver was indignant, there HAD to be 2 signs, he had driven the boat in a straight line for Waratah Bay. The next morning we went for a 5 minute run in the boat down to see the sign, then back up the river looking for the "other" sign, which of course didn't exist.

Hi Blackfish glad you liked it, a bit ashamed re chasing the other boat off, but rules are rules in regard to mooring limits.

Eel, the very name has always been creepy to me, it conjures up the image of a slimy, slippery, snake-like creature that lies 'doggo' just waiting for the chance to bite you with its big teeth. After all, if there was a Loch-Ness monster it was probably just a huge eel, and eels according to folklore were 'known' to be responsible for grabbing everything from ducks to small dogs and even children. Other than a couple of varieties, for the most part, the majority of eels you're likely to encounter are more often than not, quite timid and not at all aggressive. The following is about eels that are aggressive. Long before I started 'houseboat' fishing I'd read stories about the "vicious" Pike Eels that fishermen often caught as by-catch when fishing with live bait in the Hawkesbury River and Cowan Creek systems. The mental picture I had of them was a fish very similar to other eels but with two main differences. Number one, they had plenty of big, sharp teeth and they were very aggressive and happy to use said teeth. Number two, they were often "free-roaming" the water column of a night, not sitting down close to/on the bottom. Plenty of stories had made reference to the dreadful bites inflicted by these eels on anyone who dared to tangle with them and when I first hooked one, I made sure that it was never in a position where it could 'get' anyone. In so many of the stories I'd read about Pike Eels, the angler (or his mate) had been bitten while trying to remove a hook, so my rule was simple- DON'T REMOVE HOOKS FROM PIKE EELS! Then you wouldn't get bitten. This became a "rule" of our houseboat trips. The first few of these eels we caught were around three feet long and about the diameter of a soft drink can. The mouth/jaws on one this size wasn't very large and not overly impressive either, nevertheless care was still to be taken with them boat-side. It wasn't until one particular houseboat trip that this all changed. Seven of us had taken a ten berth houseboat to Jerusalem Bay in Cowan Creek for a week chasing Hairtail, something we did every winter for over 25 years. We'd arrived early in the day to secure our 'preferred' mooring in the small inlet of Pinta Bay, but the deeper mooring was in use and we ventured to the opposite side of the main part of the creek to a small point where we'd had some Hairtail success in years past. After mooring the boat front and back so it wouldn't swing at all, we all fished for Yellowtail (a small fish that are high on the Hairtail's menu) and as usual for the area, were able to quickly fill the plastic washing basket we used to keep our live bait in. The round basket sits within a bicycle inner-tube and negates the need for having to use an aerator, which are noisy little things when you are in tranquil and quiet waters. An hour and a half of Yellowtail fishing and plenty of bait secured. The rest of the day was spent preparing Hairtail traces - (they have razor sharp flat edged teeth, so wire leaders are almost "compulsory".) The making of "chunk" burley for "cubing" when a Hairtail school arrives and preparing a "drip burley"- so there is a constant attraction for the masses of small bait sized fish, (which in turn attract the roving Hairtail schools), rigging a mass of rods and arranging rod holders fashioned mainly from PVC pipe to our own chosen boat positions, got us to within an hour or so of the "pulse time" of dusk. The excitement on board the houseboat starts to "ramp-up" as the sun starts to disappear behind the high hills, as dusk, regardless of the tide is prime Hairtail hunting time and baits for Hairtail are lowered to our favourite depths, that range from 10 to about 40 feet. Just before dark we got the first bite and on these trips, everything is treated as a 'Hairtail' bite. With Hairtail, when they take the bait, you generally give them anything from six or eight feet of line as a minimum so they can swim off and swallow it, sometimes they'd be given thirty feet if they were hard to hook. Doing this with some of the other species encountered would result in either totally missed bites or in the case of Pike Eels, they would swallow it right down and be deep hooked. This night , there were no Hairtail around and this first bite, along with the next twenty or so were all Pike Eels. Not the same sized ones we'd caught previously, these were big, all four and five feet long weighing up to we figured, around fifteen pounds. There was a big school of them stationed below the houseboat and we couldn't catch anything but them. My own theory is that when you get a school of big Pike Eels such as these, they scare everything off, as they seem to attack pretty much any of the other smaller river species. After battling them for a couple of hours, we got sick of re-rigging and decided to stop fishing for a while, in the hope that the school would move on. The state of origin league game was on the radio, so we all stayed inside the cabin away from the cold and listened to the game. When the match was over about half of the guys decided to fish on, but were dismayed that as soon as a bait was lowered over, a Pike Eel would quickly devour it, and the line would need re-rigging yet again. One by one, the guys decided to turn in, some leaving lines over in the hope of a passing Hairtail. I was last to bed that night and I thought it prudent to bring in all the lines, as it was doubtful anyone would give up the warmth of their sleeping bag for the freezing air just to check their bait. Just as I was about to bring in the last rod, the ratchet whined, indicating something had grabbed the bait. The rod belonged to one of the sleeping bag brigade inside and was a short, super heavy deep sea rod complete with big sidecast reel and about forty pound line- more suited to dropping heavy sinkers on an offshore reef than doing the style of fishing we were doing. I picked the rod up, felt the weight pulling away and struck. The tell-tale 'wobble' of another Pike Eel struggled somewhere in the depths below. A few minutes later, yet another really big eel was writhing around on the surface beside the boat. Houseboats are always supplied with a small dinghy, enabling shore-based excursions such as rowing in to the riverside shop or simply pulling up on a sand-flat to stretch your legs. We had secured our dinghy alongside the middle of the houseboat with a mooring line tied at each end and a life jacket hung between the two vessels to act as buffer to prevent constant bumping. The rod with Pike Eel attached had been positioned only a few feet from the dinghy and when brought to the surface, the eel was next to the dinghy's stern. Voices from inside the cabin suggested leaving the creature in the dinghy overnight so we could check it out the next morning. Although we'd now caught a heap of these eels, it had always been during the night time hours and we hadn't really checked them out. I managed from above, to drag it into the little boat easily enough, but the eel had other ideas. It broke the heavy line on the sidecast reel, then went berserk, thrashing wildly and biting everything we'd left on the dinghy's floor. and waking everyone up. Bait, burley, fishing gear and a couple of life-jackets used as seat padding were all bitten and "slimed" as the eel snapped at everything in reach, scattering everything in a mess on the dinghy's deck. There was no chance it was going to stay there and less chance of anyone getting near it to keep it there. After a couple of minutes of biting and thrashing, the eel reared up like a snake and slipped back over the side, leaving everything behind in a mess. I can still remember the sound of it latching onto and crunching an empty Red Bull can that was on the floor. Next morning one of the guys hopped into the dinghy to reorganise the eel's mess and picked up the Red Bull can. There was a perfect impression left from the eels teeth in the half-crushed can. What was surprising about this impression was that it revealed that these eels seemed to have an extra row of teeth. By the puncture marks left in the can, these teeth were in a line, top and bottom, running exactly down the centre of the eels mouth, from throat towards the tip of the mouth. Immediately this 'discovery' brought disagreement from those on board. Surely the eel had bitten the can several times and we were actually looking at multiple bites, not just one and that was where the 'extra' teeth marks had come from. I didn't agree as it was me who'd caught it and observed it's frenzied 'rampage' and the biting of the can. The only way to settle the argument was to catch another one and have a closer look. All agreed and we now set out to fish for the very creatures we'd scorned less than twelve hours earlier! Typically of fishing, and as it was in the sunshine of the morning, no eels could be tempted to the bait. We would have to wait for nightfall to try for eels again, but we had decided to go back to the spot in Pinta Bay. We'd already planned the move and after a big breakfast, up anchored and moved off in the direction of our originally intended anchorage at Pinta Bay, about a quarter of a mile away. From where we'd been anchored you couldn't see around a corner into Pinta and didn't know if the mooring we wanted was still occupied. Public Moorings have a maximum use time limit of twenty four hours use and must then be vacated; as we hadn't sighted any other boat traffic coming up Jerusalem Bay, we knew the mooring was expected to be vacated shortly as that time had expired. As we rounded the point and sighted what should have been an empty mooring, we were disappointed to see that the previous vessel still hadn't left. After approaching slowly, we asked the occupants of the boat how long they intended to stay. The reply was "none of your business, get lost!" As it turned out, not a good choice of reply to a simple question. We then pointed to the clearly visible inscription on the mooring buoy which states "LIMITED TO ONE VESSEL-STRICTLY 24 HOUR USE ONLY" and they had been there 25 hours at least. Again "Get lost" was the reply. OK, we'll see about that. The other boat was now declared "hostile" and we motored about fifty metres away to decide on what to do next. We noticed the hostile vessel had been playing classical music, had a small "Union Jack" flag flying from it's bridge and appeared to have two middle aged couples on board. There were seven of us, all in our thirties, so a "pirate-like" takeover was immediately suggested or a "burley bombardment" with our smelly burley of chopped pilchards, tuna, bread, chook pellets and whale oil -either of these ideas however would have no doubt got us into a lot of trouble, so another plan was needed. Pinta Bay is only about two hundred and fifty metres long by about a hundred and a bit wide, roughly 46 feet deep and surrounded by the steep, high hills of Kuringai Chase National Park. It is fairly well protected from the strong Westerly winds of winter and an ideal spot to fish for Hairtail. Abundant schools of various small bait-fish seem ever present, which are easily captured and returned as live bait for the seasonal 'Hairies'. We had fished the spot every season for many years and had waited for our turn on the mooring, so we felt justified on the action we took next. A "Sex Pistols" CD was placed in the music system we'd brought, a loud track selected and the volume turned up loud, it would have been audible across the water miles away. Circling the "hostile" boat a couple of times like Indians circling a wagon train in a wild west movie was also suggested, however, It wasn't long before they started up their engine and cast off the mooring. This resulted in a huge cheer from all on board our boat and we all stood next to each other in a line and gave a long salute to the departee's, who returned fire with the 'bird' salute to us. OK, not very nice of us I admit, but what else can you do when people break the strict mooring laws we all abide by? Spot secured and after mooring, we went about the business of catching bait, making burley and other such chores. The day was pretty uneventful, which is fairly common for this type of fishing- everything happens of a night, when the predatory Hairtail are actively hunting under the cover of darkness. Other species like Tailor, Mulloway, Snapper and Bream are also more active at night, as are Squid and the Pike Eels. Often, daytime fishing for Garfish passes the time. On this night ,the prime dusk time came and went without any action at all, other than the abundant bait fish that now were in their thousands all around the boat. On this trip one of the guys had brought his seventeen foot half cabin boat along, enabling at least a few of the crew at a time to search for Hairie's further afield in one of the many other bays of the Cowan system. I decided to stay with the houseboat and said I'd go in the half cabin on it's next run, as we still had three more nights on the river to come. Three of the guys took off into the darkness with the idea of staying away for at least a few hours. Around twenty minutes after the half cabin left, a smokey looking fog started to descend upon the now silent bay and hovered cloud-like, less than a hundred feet above our boat, blocking the little moonlight previously visible. Whether this was a trigger of sorts for the fish to come on the bite, or perhaps it was just that a school of Hairies had swum into our bay, I don't know, but bites started and it was 'action stations' for the crew. When Hairtail are moving around in the system actively hunting, they usually only stay around for about fifteen minutes or so unless they find an easy food source and this is where being organised with pre-made burley is important. About a half bucket of 'chunked' Pilchard, Yellowtail and Mullet was at the ready for whenever a potential school turned up and these were thrown out in hand-full's when action was happening. Definitely keeps them around and the proof is they have this same burley in them when they're being cleaned. Most of us used two purpose-rigged Hairtail lines, complete with long wire traces and cyalum 'light-sticks' that act as fish attractor's. Using the wire trace and light-stick usually deterred most other species, so when bites came they were mostly from Hairies. Within twenty minutes we landed five beauty's and lost a few before the school moved off. Some years they are all similar size, sometimes they are really large, but in smaller schools. This night they were big ones, all over five and a half feet-"trophy size" to us. Then all quiet again, but at least we knew they were around and they'd usually return at some point during the night, if not several times. Once you've caught your first one for the trip, the pressure was off- we all get pretty competitive when it comes to Hairtail, as some years they're rarer than Unicorns- our "code name" for them. An hour or so passed and the fog got lower, now only twenty to thirty feet above the water, creating a surreal effect that looks like smoke with water droplets in it. The silence was broken by the sound of a reels ratchet alarm, indicating a fish was there. Beauty, are the Hairtail back? Same sort of run with the bait and I could see the light-stick moving off horizontally through the water column, indicating a Hairtail was swimming away with the bait. Well at least I thought it was a Hairtail. Not so. I was using eight pound mono and on setting the hooks, the fish bolted, peeling off some forty or so yards of line. After about five minutes of to-and-fro, I was convinced I had the most massive Hairtail ever. I've been lucky enough over the years to catch plenty of Hairie's over the 'magic' six foot mark and when they reach that sort of length, they also broaden considerably in body size and have a much greater 'purchase' on the water. After ten and then fifteen minutes I was calling it for the biggest Hairy of all time, as every time I started to get it towards the boat it would tear off again, shaking as they often do in their efforts to dislodge the hook. The rest of the crew started wondering what I was doing and why it was taking so long to get the fish at least near the boat, so we could get a look at it. While the battle was on, the fog started to come down even more, giving the bay a real 'spooky' effect, with visibility dropping to a point that you couldn't even see the other end of the houseboat. This fog is common on freezing, still nights up there in winter. More than twenty minutes from hook-up passed before I started to get the upper hand with the 'Hairy' and was getting line back on the reel. Then suddenly the light-stick on the line came into view and a few seconds later there was a swirl on the surface and what I thought was a massive Hairy writhed around before making one last run. Don't lose it now! This time it only went about ten yards and I managed to stop it and bring it back to the surface next to the bow. In the misty fog it lay there on its side and someone grabbed a torch for a better look. Due to the long fight it was just lying there and revealing it's massive length- I reckon it was well over seven and maybe even eight feet long. The guys grabbed both gaffs we'd brought with us, each being about six feet long and I got the 'Hairy' into a position so we could gaff it and drag it aboard. However, something didn't seem right. It's belly looked white, not the magnificent shiny chrome colour that it should have been. Hairtail, for those who have never seen one, have flat bodies with the most brilliant silver/chrome colouration that you could imagine. In fact they genuinely appear to have been dipped in chrome and polished to a mirror finish. This huge creature just didn't fit the bill. At first, in the weak torchlight it did look the right colour, but someone grabbed a brighter torch and the true identity was revealed- a giant Pike Eel, much lighter in colour than those the previous night. I had caught a big Hairtail in the earlier session that was six foot three inches long, the largest of the whole trip it turned out, and this eel was at least a couple of feet longer and looked as thick as a soccer ball. Big Anton put the gaff in through the gills and was about to drag it on board when I stopped him. I didn't want that monster on board, no way! A second gaff was sunk in, this time through it's open gill cover and the boys were confident they had it under control. Not so! Even though it was impaled on two gaffs you could see it trying to lunge at each gaffer, so I said that's it, cut it off. Anton argued that if I didn't want it he was happy to take it home- we could open up the back underfloor hatch and keep it down in the bilge, out of harms way. He changed his mind when it opened it's mouth fully, revealing not only it's massive teeth, but also the argued third row running down the centre. Besides, who would be game to go through the hatch and underneath to retrieve it from the bilge?- which contained a few inches of water depth, probably enough to keep it alive. After cutting the line we shook it from the gaffs and it fell back in and swam off. The boys on the half cabin got lost in the fog and didn't return until just before dawn when the fog had risen to a few feet off the water. No Hairtail boated or sighted on the sounder in any of the other bays they tried. I noticed Nobody got down on the water level platform at the back of the boat for the rest of that night.

We had to put the Rid on before even getting out of the car at Hammerhead car park or they'd be all over you instantly. Like I said ,I hate 'em and they love me

Hi Dieter as a kid I was playing in the water on the rocks at Shellharbour with the family, who were eating oysters and fish and chips and we started feeding what we thought was a fish hiding in a crevice, At first it didn't come out enough to see any more than it's snout and would only take food dropped close to it's nose. I even touched it a couple of times. Should have seen how horrified my Mum was when it finally came about halfway out, revealing it's true identity of a green eel. Guess it could have bitten me, but was only really interested in the bits of battered fish Clad to hear you seen big eels too! They've followed me- too closely- when I used to prawn down the Parramatta River

Hi Pete I reckon there must be heaps of muddies in the top end of that creek, but that's where those "Tiger Mozzies" are as well- most agro mozzie's I've ever seen and they just loved me!

Hi Ryder great rod and fantastic it's still in good nick. I have a pretty big collection of tackle and my favourite piece is a Shakespeare 2499 spinning reel, which used to be the worlds smallest, Only held about 160 yards of thin 4 lb mono and 220 of 2 lb Damyl Steelpower- which used to be the worlds finest diameter line. Original one was stolen, but after a really long search over many months, found one on ebay in USA. Sorry for no photo- it's in storage currently

Thanks Scotty! I've always been a "sponge" for all information fishy and I'm just trying to put some things on for some "escapism" from the scary reality we are all going through. Really glad you're enjoying them and thanks for the great feedback!