Fishing

Today we decided to go fishing - so we started - with no knowledge and no equipment - Good place to start!

We went to a tackle and bait shop on Rockingham foreshore and admitted our ignorance, they were great -we got rods, reels, hooks, weights, little bits that go between the weights and hooks (for some reason), bait, and loads of leaflets showing what fish we could catch and how to do it and a DVD on fishing basics, all for about $80.00 (about £32.00). So now we're all set - we didn't look at the DVD but took our books, rods etc to Palm Beach Jetty and fished of there this evening - after several helpful spectators giving us advice, we thought we knew what we were doing. Anyway to cut a long story short I caught a tiddler which I threw back and John caght 4 tiddlers which he threw back AND a Leatherjacket - We were told this is what it was and our books confirmed it - which we kept and took home to eat (Well it did us a starter!) So now as an educated fisherperson I can tell you that the Leatherjacket is so named because it doesn't have any scales - when you fillet it, you take off the head as normal, then peel the skin back like a 'leather jacket'.

We did get a surprise with this one - when I was trying to cut its head off I had to apply a bit of pressure and its stomach split (yuk) and out came its most recent meal - live with legs still moving - I think it was some sort of yabbi or bug (crayfish type of thing), and then another one again still moving - I bet they thought they'd been saved - till I killed them and threw them in the bin (well what else was I supposed to do with them?).

So now we're going to try again to get a proper meal! We'll watch the DVD first...... and let you know how we go on.