Spanker

Hi all, Did you guys see that Fishraider and this social was mentioned in the Sunday SMH in the fishing column? Go Fishraider!!!!!!!!!!!! Spanker

Nice work Tyrone! Tell us more, size of the fish, beach, conditions, the fight . Also if you ate 'em, hoe do you cook your tailor? Spanker

Holy Cow Batman!!!!!!!!!! Would love to see a post of the battle. Also what was in the fishes guts?

Clutch your boys better stop getting injured, if the AB's don't win the RWC this year then they never will.

Thanks lads. The missus is taking me out for the seafood buffet art Cafe opera in the Inter-Continental Hotel in town. I intend to eradicate whole family groups of crustaceans The folks have the kids so it's a dirty weekend for me and the !

Hi Davy, Yeah mate I know what you mean, but fair dinkum a great dirty pointy bit was stick out from between his ribs - who knows what that was goign to do to him. The eye of the hook took a little bit of wiggling, other than that is just slid out. If the hook was in his throat or mouth I would leave it there rather than rip flesh apart. Anyone know how fast (or slow) stainless steel hooks take to rust in sea water? Where is old RH these days anyway? Spanker

I snuck down to the wier on the LCR and was throwing a bit of chicken around about 20 meters down stream. I could see schools of bream, mullet and drummer, all doing their thing. About 3rd cast and a cheeky little blighter latches on for a quick fight on light gear. To my surprise, up comes a small tailor. Chuckling about what a greedy little fish he is, a notce something red just sticking out of his side. Whaa? The point of a red hook is poking out of the side of him from way down in his gut. I got the pliers and worked it out - a whole flipping big red suicide he had swallowed and it had pieced the stomach and was working it's way out. So after removing that hook, I removed my hook and threw the blighter back. That's one lucky fish Spanker

Mate don't apologise, it annoys me when people have a crack at people for keeping fish within the law.

Haha. Is there a way we could set up a drop box on FR and then once a month someone tally up the results in an .xl spreadsheet and posts the results. If the regular Kingfish, Salmon, Jew, Bream and Flathead catches were recorded, after a couple of months the results would be fascinating. It might be that tackle vendors would even be interested in this "research".

Hi lads, From time to time people mention what is in a fishes guts after cleaning. I think this is fascintaing and wonder how close the link is between catch rates and proximity of our offering (bait or lure) to what fish are feeding on at the time. Would it be worth it or even possible to have a data dump on FR where people can list; what species they caught, what was in the fish gut, what bait/lure they were using? I reckon after 3 month and maybe a couple of dozen samples for a particular species, there could be some interesting results. eg how to get the fish to bite when they're obviously feeding - but not on what you have to offer. eg whiting consistant;y sowing up in the gut a big beach jew, possibly a new bait alternative. Just a thought Spanker

Hi Fishraiders, A good mate has a holiday house down in Vincentia, Jervis Bay. We have been done there for a few boys weekends away but not gotten past the beer, bbq and xbox. The missus loves the place so it is likely to be a regular but I have no idea about good spots and will never have time these days (2 kids) to explore. Can someone throw a couple of spots at me for land based? Happy to chase fish from the beach but prefer a nice rocky edge for spinning and floating baits. Thanks fellas Spanker

Clifton gardens meant to be one of the best night time sydney harbour dives. Apparently there is a colony of seas horses that are really worth seeing and a tone of nocturnal species. Probably an awful lot of tackle on the bottom too.

Busted off eh? Those divers go pretty hard on light tackle, especially if you foul hook them in the groin. Spanker

Having spent a little bit of time in the army here are my impressions. The army is essentially an extention of the public service which has largely escaped much of the change other elements of the public service has been exposed to over the last 20 years. E.g. No one gets fired for poor performance. Indeed par for the course is to transfer underperforming staff to another unit. No one gets rewarded for excellent service. There are no bonuses or variable remuneration for high achievers. As promotion prospects are so limited and are largely made on seniority anyway, quality people leave the army in droves every year in digust. If we look at the cumulative effect og the first two points, you get a high aggragate of under-acheivers who don't give a toss, further accelerating the loss of quality people who don't want to work with bums and morons. Divorce rates are sky high, as is alcoholism and pornagraphy. These three things feed eachother and turn diggers into eternal teenagers, ever getting smashed and chasing girls. Amusing in 18 year olds, pathetic in 35 year olds. Beaucracy - you ain't seen nothing until you have been in the army. Inefficiency is order of the day. Given that it costs upwards of 100,000 to train an infantryman and most people leave within 4 years - if they delt with personnel issues, people would stay longer, less outlays on and need for recruitment, more money for resouces and such. For goodness sake much of our standard issue gear was veitnam era or earlier. Accountability, performance related pay and promotion, retention schemes. I comment on the institution of the army, not it soldiers or tranditions. Spanker

Mate some filthy rich bastard, like Packer, should institute a 20 year plan to remove all commercial fishing from Australian waters. Buy out all licesenses and transition the pros in to fish farming. We have more coastline than bloody anyone and sit in the middle of the biggest seafood market in the world - ASIA! We should be exporting billions of $$$ worth of fish to Asia. Huge employement opportunites Huge export dollars Mega boost to environment Mega boost to tourist $$$ as Aus becomes world fishing & diving heaven I surrender my soap box Spanker ps wish federal government would sponsor nationwide projects like that, we don;t have enough rich bastards like the US.

We used to swim in the river further up near the boatshed 20 years ago - knowing the muck in the river and the critters that live in there, makes me cringe at the thought now. Boppa, who is a ranger there, has been trying to organise a Carp fishing session for years. Wonder what happened to the last plan for carp session?

I told this story on the site a year ago but here goes again. After being endlessly fascinated by the huge carp patrolling the shoreline of the freshwater side of the weir, I decided to come back one night for a secret squirrel mission to have a crack at them. I convinced a mate (non-fisher) to come out for a laugh so one Saaturday night we stocked up on corn and bread and packed the fishing gear. we parked in the steakhouse car park on Ladygame Dr and snuck in to the National park about 10pm. All was quiet, was threw out some corn and bread and then our lines. All was quiet for 10 minutes when carlights start approaching. That's strange I say, as the gates are usually locked after hours. The lights come right on us and the car accelerates. S*$t I yell, it's the Ranger. My mate and I madly reel in the lines, grab the bucket and tackle bag and hightail it back dow the weir. While we are hooting like madmen the rnager puts his highbeam on and flies after us, only to have to stop because of posts around the carpark. Anyway we bolted into the bushes and collapsed in hysterics. Probably totally unrelated but a police car screamed past 5 minutes later. For 2 old farts it was more fun then we had had in ages. I subsequently organised a raider social down there which has a laugh but a carp non-event.

Holy shut, thut wud pull like the bist fush iva. Fibulous!!!

Mate if you take a walk on the wier early morning or in the afternoon you will see clouds of fish hanging around. Swarms of bream, blackfish, flathead, taylor and masses of mullet. Throw some bread around and you can really get the water boiling. At night time there is the constant splashing of mullet jumping. I have actually considered getting a hand cast net and loading up on live mullet as prep for harbour jew fishing..however hand cast nets being illegal and all never got past the thinking stage.

Mullet - LCR is full of mullet, further upstream towards the wier you go the more there are. Chances are if anything decent is heading up the river looking for a feed it is chasing mullet. Spanker

hehehe nice one. Forwarded to a mate who has just been separated, I am sure he will greatly appreciate.

A big shame this all is. His poor family I agree with the sentiments that we're human and forgiveness is vital (reference Balkans etc). My comment would be though is if you use the media for your own ends, you're fair game for the media to use you. If you actively have a crack a people morally - on tv, radio etc., then you shoudl expect to be judged by the same yard stick. I haven't heard ol rexy on the radio but am told he doesn't mind giving it to people when it comes to personal issues. Rex has been around a long time, he knows the score, thus his attempt to control exposure damge via the press. In light of this you have to really respect the few stars who do totally shun the press from their privtae lives in the good times, and thus are protected in the bad times. Tom Cruise used to be like that, now he is using the press for all it;s worth. He must know the minute his personal life turns sour the press will be putting out theirs hands in the thousands for payback time. Actually here is a frightening thought - Tom Cruise could be the next Michael Jackson.... Spanker

Holy crap! What are they goig to do about the houses? If I lived there I'd be on the phone to the insurance company pretty quick making sure premiums and cover fully topped up.

Off to Akuna Bay in the morning with the old man for a bit of good ol fashioned quality time. Hoping to escape the wind and both on the coast. Couple of bacon and egg rolls and some good coffee - you beauty!

Clutch we all love your reports and photography. I would almost sponsor you to go out and catch big snapper and kings just to post the reports and photos. You're a blessed man to have a missus who will cheerily wet a line. Good on ya mate spanker