OK, my last fishing report really laid it on the line. I'd had enough of that pesky son of mine (Arron) taking all the glory when it came to catching big Manukau reds. It seems he's not the only one that has set out to undermine my fishing cred. It's a conspiracy and I'm NOT happy!
So what do you do when your crew's prime reason for fishing is to knock you off the perch? I'll tell you what I did. I accepted an offer from a mate that I thought had some credentials as a gurnard catcher of some merit, to go fishing last Saturday.
The conversation went something like this:
'Hey Smudge, I'm going fishing on Saturday and I'm stuck for a crew. I've asked Neil and he can't make it. Know anyone?'
'Sure Stu, I have loads of friends, let me ask them'.
I struggled to think of anyone.
'Stu, I've been in touch with all my friends and everyone of them is busy'.
'That's a bugger Smudge, I may have to cancel'.
I really didn't want to see Stu miss out on some great fishing so I kindly offered to fill the gap'. 'Oh, OK Smudge, I guess i can squeeze you on board but I have found some mates to come out anyway, so the boat's full., but if you promise to keep things simple you can tag along but bring your own beer this time!'. Hardly the reception I was hoping for. Surely the skipper should supply the beer.
Still, we hatched a plan for Saturday and that plan was for Stu to pick me up at 6.30am. So I waited in the cold dark & foggy conditions for a full two minutes when a Safari towing a 691 Tristram pulled up.
We loaded the gear on and off we went.
We had a great plan to catch some snapper and then nail some gurnard. On board were Stu's mate 'Growler' and Stu's brother 'Doodle'. It wasn't long before I found out the origins of their names. Suffice to say that these names were much more polite than the original versions. The fog was intense and the two non locals quickly showed their true colours by complaining about the cold. It wasn't anywhere near cold of course. It was at least 4 degrees. In between complaining they talked about catching gurnard. Stu and I assured them that we would get plenty, after all Stu is a very good carrot catcher and I'm supposed to be skilled in that department too.
We dropped anchor and in came the snapper, one after another. As the biggest was lucky to be 20cm we decided to move. Now Stu and I were getting a hard time with the crew reminding us of the promise of catching big reds and gurnard. So we moved, a good 200m.
That did not inspire confidence until this happened:
'That's a good eel Growler' I said. 'Nah, it's a shark!' replied Stu.
'Nah it's a snapper and it's a good one' said Growler.
That was ten pounds of lovely Manukau red right there! 'I should manage something better' I said without even a hint of arrogance.
But this was all I could manage:
Still it was a nice fish of close to 5lb. Then Stu had to push the envelope and show me up with this:
Doodle caught a fish too, but by now I was in no mood to take pics of yet another person catching bigger fish than me, so no Doodle pics sorry.
With our bin looking very full, we set off on a gurnard mission. Doodle and Growler had heard many, many stories of epic gurnard catches and were pumped. Very excited.
First stop, Stu's number one incoming tide spot. We caught one gurnard, a nice fat fish of one kilo for me.
While we were there, Stu's mate Trevor stopped by.
We may have given him the impression we caught the snapper there. We may have also given him the impression that we were near our limit of big fish. Not our fault he thought that. Anyway, as soon as he dropped anchor we moved.
Next stop was another of Stu's favourite spots. Please note the lack of pictures. So we went to my go to place 'Crab Island!' Yeah! sorry I don't have any pics from there either
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All up, four real nice snapper from 2 to 5 kilos and two keepable gurnard.
Not a bad day, made all the more enjoyable by a great crew. Tops!