August 2005 Newsletter

AUGUST 2005 NEWSLETTER

Waihau Bay PDC 07 325 3949

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN OF THE

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING AND PRIZE GIVING

OF THE WAIHAU BAY SPORTS FISHING CLUB INC

The meeting is to be held at the Waihau Bay Fire Station at 3.30pm on Saturday 3^rd September 2005.

Agenda

Apologies, Minutes of the last AGM, Business Arising from those minutes, Presidents Report, Financial Report, Election of Officers and committee and General Business.

The following committee members are due to retire by rotation but are available for re-election.

Clyde Fraser – President

Christine Elmiger – Secretary

Mark Jarlov, Ed Harrrison, Dave Clarke, Barry Sanford – Committee

There is one empty committee position. A nomination form is included with the newsletter.

The meeting will be followed by the annual presentation of trophies and various awards. A light meal will be provided at no cost and refreshments will be provided. Remember you must be a financial member of the club to nominate committee etc or speak at the AGM. Subs become due on the day of the meeting and may be paid then if you wish.

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING OF

THE WAIHAU BAY COASTGUARD

The AGM of our Coastguard will also be held on Saturday the 3^rd at the Fire Station. This meeting will begin at 2.30pm. Please do try and come along and support these people who provide you all with such a great service throughout the year.

A Boat Registration Form has been included so if you have not already done so please complete it and return.

This is to be used in the event of an emergency at sea and a copy will be given to the Coastguard.

The Building of the Clubrooms!

Thanks to some really wonderful club members this is progressing well. At the time of writing we are ready for the roof to go on, have had the glass people up to measure for the windows and are organising the cladding. It is not an easy time of year and weather conditions have not always been favourable but the building is looking great and we will be carrying on as we are able, working in with those available to help and trying to dodge the rain.

Thanks to those people who are so generously donating their time, the club is going to have an awesome building on a beautiful site and still be debt free. We are all looking forward to the opening!

Welcome to the New Holiday Park owners

The club would like to wish a warm welcome the new proprietors of the Waihau Bay Holiday Park, Puti and Steve Rowe. We hope they have a happy and prosperous time here on ‘ the coast’.

NZ Big Game Fishing Council Trophies 2005

1^st Marlin of the Season Weighed (over 90kgs)

04.01.05 Daniel Hawkins Whangarei Deep Sea Anglers Club

Ist Marlin of the Season Tagged

07.11.04 Graeme Sowerby BOI Swordfish Club

Saul Trophy (Most tagged fish)

79 fish Richard Hart Raglan Sportfishing Club

Lord Norrie Gold Cup (Heaviest Striped Marlin)

172.80 kgs Dean Barlow Mercury Bay Ocean Sports Club Inc

Fisherman of the Year (Heaviest Game Fish)

Don Haddon 301 kg Blue Marlin Waihau Bay Sports Fishing Club

The Peter & Noeline Short Memorial Trophy (Most tagged billfish)

22 fish Carmen McIntyre Whangaroa Big Gamefish Club

Old Man and The Sea Cup

Carl Angus Tautuku Fishing Club

The Top Junior Angler Cup

Robbie Angus Whangaroa Big Gamefish club

The Hart Trophy (For the best photograph taken by an amatuer photographer)

Mark Hemingway Mt Maunganui Sportfishing Club

Fishing Club Calendar 2005

Annual General Meeting – Saturday September 3^rd

Waihau Bay Lodge Labour Weekend Competition Friday 21^st to Sunday 23^rd October

Tuna Tournament Dec 27^th to Jan 2^nd 2006

Auckland Anniversay Weekend Sweepstake Fri, Sat, Sun

NZ Big Game Fishing Council Nationals Feb (last week Saturday to Saturday – 8 days)

Waihau Bay Holiday Park Easter Competition Fri, Sat, Sun

Don’s Big Day – A tale from one of our members

Don, or "Big D" as I call him, is a regular fisho on my boat and has fished several of the Nationals with me. When I called him a month before this years Nationals, he said "count me in" and we decided we would make the final decision on where to fish closer to the time. With all the stripey action on the West Coast, we could be staying closer to my home ground out of Huia, but we kept our ear to the ground and Waihau was sounding pretty good and that being my second home, it was "no contest". With the chance of catching a big blue over a stripey, we were off to stay at my mate James Walker's farm and he would make up our third regular crew member for the Nationals.

We arrived at James on Friday with the pig dogs in tow, in case we got a layday in the weather. As it turned out, the weather was mint throughout the Nationals, never exceeding 10 knots the whole week, so the dogs got a week's holiday as it turned out. Our plan was for a casual approach, without crack of dawn starts, but certainly to try and get a blue or two. So our team was searching around the ocean off Waihau Bay, hearing on the radio of the blues getting hooked and lost, but it was slow for us, except losing a stripey after 15 minutes on day two. On day three we nailed a stripey and the water was really looking good off Orete Point, so I said to the boys we would work that area the next day.

On day four we set the gear in 100 meters off Orete, (about 3 miles from the boat ramp) and we had a shot from a blue which pulled some string, but fell off. Five minutes later, in 130 meters, we had another shot on the other rigger from a really big blue and it was "big D's" turn on the rod. I nicknamed him "Big D", because in fact he's not a big man, probably around 70 kilos. Don is into the fish, with it doing "the blue thing" all over the ocean on an oily calm day, magic to see. Don is a very experienced angler and we kept chasing it down, with Don having to work very hard on the 37 kg stand-up outfit. Every time we got close to it, it scorched off and then went deep after 55 minutes. Don worked it back up and James got close to the leader but down it went again, pulling off over 100 meters and then stalemating out for the next 10 minutes. We tried to work out what it was up to but then realised my greatest fear, that it was dead on the bottom, and realising this meant an even tougher battle was just about to begin for Don. I have experienced this twice before with big blues on my boat and rotten them both, so knew what we had to do and it was going to be a titanic battle for any man. When you become the lifting mechanism for 301 kgs of dead fish, it is certainly an advantage to weigh more than 70 odd kilos !

We got a bit of angle on the line and then I told "Big D" to put the Shimano 80 up to "sunset" and hold the spool with his hands as hard as he could, not letting any line leave the reel, being confident of my knots and knowing he wouldn’t be able to break the 37 kg line over the rod tip. Now the grunting and groaning really started and for 45 minutes we made no headway at all, despite trying different angles. Line we recovered, we would then lose as we idled off at another angle, trying to lift the fish, which had been dead by now for 65 minutes, with Don understandably getting both physically and mentally exhausted. I took the boat out of gear and asked Don if he had had enough, "don’t be stupid, I'm not giving up !" was the reply. We must have finally gotten the right angle and Don wasn’t losing any more line and the angle was improving and after 1 hour and 15 minutes she's moving and Don is feeling a lot better. Don would lock up, we would idle off and then quickly back down and recover line, after many repeats of this exercise, I could see deep colour and told Don, "there it is boy !" and after a few more manoeuvres and 1 hour after we first moved it off the bottom, 3 hours 45 minutes from the hook-up, we had her at the boat. She was stiff as a board with mud all down one side from the time on the bottom and wow, what a fish. I said "that might go 300 boys !".

Don had a big skull of juice with handshakes all around, an unbelievable effort from Don for sticking with it, not only physically for a man his size on stand-up kit,, but mental toughness is paramount to achieve such a feat. The next trick is to get it in the boat, but with help from another boat we managed and back to the Waihau Bay weigh station for the truth !

She tipped the scales at 301 kilos, in the Nationals taking out;

* Heaviest Billfish
* Champion Angler 37 kg
* Champion Angler, single fish, 37 kg
* Third in the team points

NOMINATION FORM in accordance with Rule 7 (a)

‘Nominations for the positions of President, Vice President, Hon Secretary, Hon Treasurer and members of the General Committee Shall be in writing signed by the proposer and seconder and consented to in writing by the nominee. (b) Such nominations to e in the hands of the Hon Secretary seven clear days before the Annual General Meeting.’

NOMINATIONS MUST BE WITH THE SECRETARY NO LATER THAN AUGUST 27^TH 2005.

Full Name of Nominee……………………………………………………………………………………………

For the Office of - President Secretary Committee

Signature of Nominee…………………………………………………………………………………………….

Proposed By ………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Seconded By………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

SUBSCRIPTION FORM

Please find enclosed my subscription to the Waihau Bay Sports Fishing Club Inc.

(Please list the names of all family members joining plus the birth dates for any juniors if I do not already have them.)

NB A sub includes the first family member plus their partner and any of their children under 17 years of age. The cost is $50 for the first family member and $5 for each family member after that which covers affiliation fees to the NZ Big Game Fishing Council.

If you have an email address please write it down as this saves your club money and plus you get more information that way as we cannot afford to forward things of interest by snail mail.

NAMES

1…………………………………………………………………………………………………….$50.00

2…………………………………………………………………………………………………… 5.00

3…………………………………………………………………………………………………… 5.00

4……………………………………………………………………………………………………. 5.00

Total

ADDRESS…………………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

BOAT NAME………………………………………………………………………………………………

PHONE NUMBER………………………………EMAIL ADDRESS……………………………………

Please post to Waihau Bay Sports Fishing Club , Waihau Bay PDC, OPOTIKI