What is your fondest fishing memory?

[Eelman]

What is your fondest fishing memory? Is it catching your first fish? Watching your child catch their first fish? Is it that first Jack? Or the metre plus Barra? Is it just spending time with mates or family?
Let everyone know why you love fishing.

[aussiefool]

At the moment it would have to be when my Stepdaughter got her first Tailor. Still how happy she was in the pics.

[finga]

Mine is going fishing with my nana and pop along the north wall at Evans Head.
That's where I want to be chucked into the river when I'm dead.

[mylestom]

Fishing at Shady Camp in the early eighties, with son Jason and father-in-law Stan.

Stan finally retired worked hard all his life up to three jobs and had his own bakery for years, and ten children.

Up on a few weeks holidays to visit the family and wanted to catch a barra. Headed off to our spot to do a bit of trolling. All Stan could talk about was his mates told him it would takes weeks of fishing for him to catch a barra.

Well the old war veteran, out the back with the old Nilsmaster spearhead in black with upgraded Eagle Claw 3x and Wire fuseable leader. Not long after first barra about 75cm and then two more in the first twenty minutes. The look on his face and the photo was great.

Old Stan, had that photo on top of his TV for over 20years till he passed away. Always wanted to talk about his barra, caught with his grandson.

That still bring a smile to this old dial.

Caught lots and had a few caught in the boat over the years. But the long term memory of what it was for a great old bloke does it for me.

Regards

Trev

[mookyandlumpy]

there are so many ,,, taking my dad fishing just the two of us ,out in the bay and putting him on to his biggest snapper on a plastic no less, kinda paying him back in a small way for all he has done for me over the years

good times for sure

[rosco1974]

would have to be seeing my young fella and my wife catching there 1st fish,the young fella ws 3 and 1/2 got a 33cm whiting lota creek and wife a 42cm flattie at the sandhills and catchin a painted crayfish behind green on a fishin line myself

[HeadBanger]

I'd like to say 'catching that first fish on a soft plastic,' but I'm still awaiting that day. Hopefully tomorrow:D

My fondest memory would have to be catching my first fish (yeah, I know, it's a cliche). It was a massive bream, which I caught on a handline when I was 5. Still the biggest one of caught. We didn't measure it, but from memory it would've been about 35cm. Biggest one I've caught since has only gone 28cm. Beginner's luck, eh?

Thanks,
Kaidon:freak:

[ffejsmada]

My favourite memory would be with my Grandad (who's now passed away) at Eden when I was 3 years old.
He took me fishing in Twofold bay to the Boydtown area, fishing for flathead.
He'd bait the hook for me and I'd strike when I felt the bite.
Bang.........."got another one Grandad", of course he didn't believe me, but these flathead were suicidal! Ended up getting quite a few if I remember correctly, Grandad didn't get any, he was too busy looking after me!;D

The family went to Eden for 25 years straight at Chrissy time, it was awesome, I went from 1 to 16 years of age.
We use to stay at Shadracks Beach, on old Mick Fortier's property, an old dairy farm.
Sadly, it's gone as expected, progress they call it!::)

A lot of experiences learnt and shared I can tell you!

Cheers and thanks, Jeff.

[smoked]

My favourite memory is a a couple of weeks back when i took my wife and 21 month old boy down to Jabiru Island for a fun day out. We took 1 rod and a bag of frozen prawns. Had a swim, lunch and a little fish. Id bait up and cast the rod while my boy would sit beside me holding the rod. Id watch the rod for bites, and when there was id help him set the hook. The proudest moment of my life, seeing my boy wind in his 1st fish. It was ever more touching watching him hand release the little bream. Iv had some cracker session in the past but this had definitly taken the cake. Im the proudest father alive!!

cheers, smoked

[Eelman]

Thanks guys, these are exactly the sort of replies I was hoping for. Some really good stories here and I hope it has people thinking about the good times in their life.
For me, although I've never really had any cracker days catching fish, my favourite day was a day I got to spend with my son who was visiting from SA and we just spent the whole day fishing and talking. No phone, Internet, computer games, tv, just us talking and fishing the whole day. Quality time that money just can't buy. We didn't catch anything to take home, but it didn't matter.

[PinHead]

some great memories of younger days in the fishing club...like rowing through Mackenzies, across Tiger Mullet , down through Whalleys Gutter and across to Pandanus Island i nthe middle of the night..I was about 16..damn near killed me..I was too buggered to fish by the time we got there.

[PinHead]

another trip...I was still a junior..down to Byron Bay...the club would charter a bus..the seniors all had a few sherbets on the way down there. As soon as we crossed into the NSW the wind and rai nstarted. You could not keep a line in the water. So what do the seniors decide to do..head to the pub. Us juniors stayed on the bus and kept dry and warm. After pub closing time the guys came back to the bus, wet as shags and cold. One of them spotted a log in the park near the bus. They decided to light it to get dry and warm. We all had kero lanterns in those days so they raided every bit of dry newspaper and kero that was on the bus...all to no avail. They could not get that log to light. Whe nwe woke in the morning the rain had stopped..the seniors were all still asleep in the bus sleeping off the night before. We went and had a look at the log they tried to light..the stupid buggers had spent ages trying to light a concrete house stump.

[PinHead]

another one..a trip to Caloundra after the bream in winter. We always had a stop on the way up there at the Landsborough pub. The usual set up was to have a few drinks and grab some to take away. Pubs were not open on Sundays in those days but the publican agrred to let us buy some grog from hi mand collect it on the way home on Sunday morning for a few drinks on the way home. We would give him some fish in return for him doing this. So on this trip we arrived at Landsborough to collect our grog and give the man his fish. Bugger me..the local copper comes round the corner and busts the deal..he thinks we were buying the grog there and then. He would not believe the real story but apparently it was still illegal for the publican to give out grog on a Sunday regardless of when it was purchased. The club captain went to court on that one and copped a fine which the club paid for him..those were the days.LOL
Dunno if they were the best days fishing but certainly very memorable.

[3rd degree]

I have many of memorable moments from fishing over the years, from catching tailor with my grandfather shoulder to shoulder with hundreds of others at Narrowneck as a young tacker, to my first black marlin, and there are so many more....

Here's an oldie, when I was 3, my grandfather drifted into Parrot Rocks in the Broadwater whilst putting more fuel in his tank, mean while I've dropped my line with yabbie over the side and hooked a massive flattie, so big I had all sorts of trouble holding the rod, but was eventually landed.

Cheers
Jim

[Noelm]

when I was a really little tacker, my father and grandfather used to go around the rocks at night to catch crabs for bait, my grandfather had an old carbide lamp, for those that dont know about carbide and lamps, here is a quick explanation, carbide is sort of like a smelly rock, and when water is added, it makes Accetyline gas, so the carbide lamp had a small canister sort of thing on the bottom for the carbide, and a small tank above for water, and a needle valve to control how much water dripped onto the carbide to control the gas making process, anyway, the lamp when lit is a very bright light, but too much water can cause an explosion by the over supply of gas and excess pressure, one night we were walking along the rocks looking for crabs, and next thing my grandfather lets out a high pitched scream and yells, "RUN" not knowing any better, I just headed away as fast as my tiny legs would go, he threw the torch away, and all I saw was a blinding flash and more colourful language than my little ears had ever heard, for next 15 minutes it was my father and grandfather arguing over whos fault it was and where could they ever get another torch! it was a long dark walk home that night, not a word was spoken, except for me whinging about how far it was.

[Marlin_Mike]

26 years ago, off the rocks at Penguin Head Culburra.

Wife 9 me 0..................... and she still reminds me every time we go fishing of that day.....!*@$(*&!^#$ (day.....!*@$(*&!^#$)&&#@^@!(!))!)!................... i will never hear the end of it.......:)

Mike

[STUIE63]

it was a perfect day on the shoals just off toomulla beach my father and my son sitting up the front on my old stacer tinny the boy hooked a nice lipper and dad asked should he help the boy I said no just hang onto the back of his shirt to stop him getting dragged out of the boat as there was no way he would have let go of his fishing rod . he was probably 4 or 5 them .
hmm just sitting in the back of a boat watching your father and son in the front I don't think it gets better than that
Stuie

[Scott nthQld]

I don't have one specific one, but all my fondest memories include fishing with either my mumd, dad, grandparents, brother etc in places from the murrumbidgee and blowering dam in NSW chasing trout, redfin and murray cod, to fishing Forster, jervis Bay, Port kembla, Shellharbour etc. The most prominent are ones where I can actually remember catching my first of something, like my first flathead, trout, tuna, cod, kingy, snapper etc

[PinHead]

I'll have a bloody fond fishing memory if I ever catch a legal snapper..that was the aim for 2009 so that one has gone now...LOL

[Damned67]

Many for me.....
When I was a kid, living in Tassie, the Grand Parents had an old shack at a place called 'Squeaking Point'... A 100m or so down the dirt road was an old ricketty jetty. Spent countless hours fishing off that.
For some reason, this old shack had an inground pool. I still remember the day that my Dad came back from fishing with my Uncle and grandfather, and quitely tossed a (deceased) shark in the pool!!!

My PB Snapper also comes to mind (especially as though it was only in October). I'm a terrible fisherman. But this catch was text book fishing... I was out at Harry's, in terrible weather, with my son. We'd only just got there, and my son pointed out some birds smashing the surface not far from us. We quitely motored over, and I tossed a 30gm Maniac towards the frey. Second cast, landed a barely legal tailor. Very quickly filleted it, and tossed a slab of of down into the water. Within 3min I was onto my 3rd legal snapper, which was also my 3rd PB Snapper in 3 weeks, that went 78cm and 4.5kg. Oh, and the weather was so bad, that my son didn't even want to do another drift, just wanted to head for home..... with a half of the snapper hanging out of the pitiful esky!

Have had plenty of great memories fishing with my son (Snag King) who's my primary fishing partner, and on 95% of my fishing outings. Probably one of the most memorable was fishing Green Island earlier in the year. He caught a tuskie/parrot on a SP. He's first ever 'reef' fish. He was elated. He was smiling more than I'd seen in a long time (other than scoring a goal at Soccer). It was well and truly legal, so I decided to slit it's throat and ice it. Of course, amatuer me decided to hold it over the side of the boat while slitting it's throat... Before I even got the knife in, it flipped straight out of my hands and back into the briney. My Friend (that was on the boat at the time) and myself still crack ourselves up at how quickly he went fromso happy to so sad... It was funny at the time, for everyone but my son... Oh, and I now bleed everything IN the boat. Hey, it was only a month or two old at the time!

Another, just before ordering my Viper, I hired a boat from Bribie Island Boat Hire, and took the wife fishing for her first time ever. We'd been using plastics, and were sitting in less than a metre of water. I was retying a jighead for her, and she was literally just swimming my SP right under the boat. Suddenly, it took off! As we were in a metre of water and the lure was right under the boat, the fish came to the surface VERY quickly. It was the biggest Flathead I'd ever seen, and I'd caught my PB flattie, at 62cm, about 2 weeks earlier. This one was MUCH bigger. The excitement of it all made it look about 1m long... of course, it was probably only 65-70cm! Regardless, as soon as she saw it on the surface, she gave the rod the most almighty yank I'd ever seen, and almost took my eye out with the lure.
On the plus side, she decided that the 3.95 stacer we hired was too small, so I was given permission to buy something a little larger (4.2m Viper)!

And finally, my little Princess, Eloise. Weeks after getting the boat, the Pirtek fishing challenge was on ( and I encourage everyone to take part in it this year!!)
She ended up placing second in the Junior category with her Flathead, and got a wonderful certficate and a pretty pink fishing rod to go with it!!!
(A big thumbs up to the organisers!!!)

[JEWIENEWIE]

spending many a night in the tinny waiting and hunting and waiting and rechecking tide charts moons etc to finally land what i was wanting. A 17kg jewie. fully stoked. ;D ;D
Jewienewie

[ColJacDak]

Late 1970s. Fishing with my father in the Gulf, I was 7 until I was 14, Twice a year every year, May and August,( the original school holidays) for 2 weeks. We would drive from Hughenden To Delta Downs or Karumba, Older people will remember The Steep Bank at Karumba, Awesome fishing in those days, Fill your freezer and head home, Salmon Grunter(the biggest you will ever see)Jewfish Barra Prawns Monster crabs, Alot of fish were caught, Dad has gone now, but what memories and photos.. Col

[4x4frog]

Sure fishing with the kids is great but I think........
it'd have to be fishing with my grand-dad on Lake Cootharaba as a kid/teen. Grand-dad took over when dad passed away when i was young.
The funniest day out was when we caught this 7lb cattie and I shoved the screwdriver from the tool box in it to stop it moving. I tried to pull the driver out but it was stuck fast and the cattie went flying over the side. Grand-dads telling of the story was the funniest thing ever though. :( :'( .

[tunaticer]

Catching my first jack at about 12 yrs old off military jetty Caloundra whilst targetting flathead with live herring. He was about 60cm and i released him in front of the crowd that gathered. I copped heaps of shit for releasing him that day from the crowd then from my parents. Funny how things have changed in the 33 yrs that have passed.

[barrabart]

G'day all......
My 3 kids (2 girls and one boy) grew up in Charters Towers, we lived there for 11 years, some of my best fishing memories are loading all the kids and the Mrs into our old "84 dual cab Hilux then bush bashing our way down to the banks of the Burdekin River (Freshwater) sometimes we'd pack some dinner and fish till dark, have dinner then bash our way home again in time for the kids to get enough sleep to head to school the next day most days we could catch between 20 and 30 black bream and sooty grunter, all the kids learnt to use there rods and reels which were lower priced Shimano eggbeaters on whippy little Silstar rods, we'd use ox heart for bait, due to the fact it stayed on the hooks the longest....... and it would give me time to do the re baiting and releasing of the fish, at times it would be like a production line of catching re baiting and releasing, and meant i didn't get a chance to wet a line, but i didn't care as the value the kids and Mrs were getting was well worth it....... The girls still use spinning out fits and will out skill the average fisho for life, the young fella moved into bait casters, starting off practising with my old Abu 6500 outfit, when he was about 10years old i bought him a Low Profile Calisto bait caster on decent Silstar rod around a $200 outfit, now at 13 he can fish unassisted with myself and my mates, and last year in a river around Tully (Saltwater) he landed a nice 80cm Barra whilst flicking lures from a punt........ I guess the moral of the story is put the effort in with the kids, and it'll bring rewards forever.

[Xahn1960]

My Grandad teaching me to fish with lures back in the 60's, cost him his favourite when I snagged it ......

[LOUIE]

Fishing 50m off shore in front of the fish freezer at Yorke Island with my son aged 10 and the Gts were as thick as flies. Him refusing to let go of the handline with fish attached before he went over the gunwhale and having to grab him by the shirt before he did so.


Louie

[bar raider]

my first cast lure caught bass

i was up the hinze and used to troll in those days, when i saw a long log just under the water, changed lures cast to the end and wound in and it's on!
pulled the bugger right out of his lounge room.

needless to say i love casting nowdays.

[snodger 08]

Watching my 10 year old catching his first fingermark at Bowen, and it was a hoarse.
Personally, when I rocked up to the kiosk at Glenlyon to find out that the 60cm Silver I caught was a monster for there. Must admit I didn't know much about silvers back then.
Steve

[levinge]

Watching my son (then 14 years old) land his first Barra, 116cm 22.5kg monster from Peter Faust Dam.

Proudest Dad on Dam that day....

[URAGANGI]

My best memory would have to be when dad was building my concentration levels by giving me a Coke bottle with just a single sinker at the end of the line. Getting any son?.....Nup was the reply.Till this day I've passed this down and bugger me it works.

The joy's of fishing sharpened as I grew older. Bloody lucky, cause I was getting hungry. Now day's as a thank you to my old man I trully treasure the times when I split my catch with him cause ,what he tought me will stay with me ,for the rest
of my life.

tight lines Gavin.