Shark Tails

[agnes_jack]

Thought this might make an interesting thread. I'll start.
Years ago my brother and myself used to do a heap of spearfishing down in Vic. We were diving at a place called Aireys Inlet at the start of the great ocean road. We were diving off the point below the lighthouse. In that area the water is fairly shallow(30-40 ft) for quite a long way offshore.
Some really top reefs there,mainly sandstone type with heaps of holes and ledges as well as good stands of kelp and weed.
Got some really nice crays down there! You tend to get a fair few decent fish in the area and one type that can get pretty big the dusky morwong. On this particular day we had done quite well and both had quite a swag of fish, a few good abalone and a few crays. We always towed our catch about 40ft behind us on floats with a net bag for the crays and abs and a stainless wire ring that we would poke thru the gills of the fish and then clip it up. My brother was a fair bit further out than myself and had just speared another big dusky, put it on the ring and pushed the float away. As he did that a white pointer about 10ft plus came around from behind and grabbed his fish and shook hell out of em till the ring broke off the float! At that stage it disapeared for a minute and my bro started the swim back to shore. The shark reappeared and circled three times before leaving him to make what was quite a long(about a km) swim back to shore. Ever since then whenever we have been diving together, I aiways seem to end up swimming on the seaward side with him between me and the shoreline!
Lets hear ya stories. Regards, Tony :o :o

[Hutcho]

Gotta love those shark stories Tony. I'm actually glad that I do not have any "corkers" to share. A 10ft great white is no goldfish. I bet your brother and you didn't go back there for a little while?!

[agnes_jack]

Hutcho
A goldfish they ain't!
Got a couple of others on that same area, but I'll wait till we get a few more replies.

Regards, Tony ;)

[jeffo]

a bloke i know is a top "spear'o" and is now an abalone diver down south. he has told me a few shark stories from around here. one was of a 14 foot hammer head that was circling him then came charging at him, he had to stick the gun under its jaw and push it over him! BUGGER THAT! i have seen to many sharks out here to jump over the side!
same bloke- his dad does/used to (not sure any more) own a few tuna boats that he would go out to work on every now and then. being the mad keen diver he is, he wanted to shoot a billfish. he had his chance when one of the lines had a marlin on it and a free swimmer with it.... so what better to do a few hundred miles out to sea than jump over the side and chase it. he shot it and got dragged a couple of hundred meters before the thing died. he was left to swim back to the boat with the billy ( i think it went about 82kg) a few hooks down the line they got a monster mako!

[Dr_Dan]

My old man told me a story about one of the diving trips that he did. ONe of the guys was diving out along a ledge. he had come across a big cave, and was pearing in side, just admiring all the fish/coral etc. He got a tap on his shoulder and thinking it was his buddy, shook him off. ANother tap, as if buddy was tryig to get a look inside the cave. Shrugged it off again, Last tap was a big one, turned round, bout a 12ft hammer head wanting to pear into the cave to see what all te fuss was bout :o :o :o . BUGGER THAT!!!!! Bet they had to get rid of the wetsuite after that. eithe rthat or give it a good clean!

[Brissyguy]

Had a call for help one year at a Snapper contest in South Aust.
The call was a manual one from a guy in the water near a 21' Swiftcraft.
As we approached the boat two other guys appeared from the other side of the sticken boat and all three swam madly toward our little Savage Tasman.
Clambering aboard they were all yelling for us to get closer to the Swiftcraft and look inside.
As we got closer there was loud banging and thumping coming from inside the boat.
As we drew alongside we saw a 12 - 14' Mako inside the boat chewing and thrashing around.

Apparently the guys had hooked the Mako and got it close to the boat after only 1 1/2 hours.
Being green and known for their aeronautical displays the Mako jumped high in the air and landed inside the boat.
Needless to say all three guys abandoned ship post haste lol.

Very frightening for the guys and costly as the Mako completely destroyed the inside of the boat, but by crikey it was so funny afterwards each time these guys retold the story.

[agnes_jack]

Same area-Aireys Inlet
Was in the victorian spearfishing championships one year,and on the second day of the comp,Aireys was the chosen site. In the spearo comps they have a points system where if a fish reaches a large size for its type E.G.-a bream of say 1.8 kg it gets what they call "bonus" which means it gets an extra 50 points. This particular day the conditions where terrible, large swell,overcast and the underwater visibility was about 2ft. But being the championship most blokes still went in. One of the fella's found a HUGE conger eel hiding in the back of a ledge, so big that he dare not spear it unless he could get a good kill shot. He knew in those conditions that this fish would be a winner so he spent ages trying to get it to come out of the ledge far enough to make his shot. By spearing a few parrotfish and stuff and using them as burley, he finally managed to get this critter to poke its head out enough for the shot. It was a perfect hit right in the back of the head, which killed it instantly. It was then hung on his float with about 40ft of line which is then clipped on to his wieght belt. By then the comp time was running out so he headed straight in to shore. About half way in he started to get dragged backwards thru the water for about 25ft. He was unable to unclip the floatline due to the pressure and on turning around could see the water being churned to foam around his float. After this he swam into shore to find that the conger had been bitten off just behind the head. The head was brought back to the weigh-in and you should have seen the size of it. In size it would have been very similar to that of a rotwielers. BLOODY HUGE!!
The head alone was wieghed in and cant remember the wieght, but the head went bonus for the species on its own!!

Tony :o :o :o :o

[Brissyguy]

Another time we were fishing for snapper on an o/nighter on what we used to call snapper drops (artificial reefs)
It was what we used to call our spot X.
One of my Dad's mates was fishing spot Y, about 2 miles further out in Spencer Gulf.
The phospherous was very high that night and you could see each snapper clearly as it was pulled toward the boat, occasionally you could see a larger, much larger, phospherant shower behind each fish as the gentlemen in grey overcoats tried to bag an easy meal.

We could hear an outboard at high speed and it was getting closer but we couldnt see the boat (Dark night)
So Dad turned on the spot light and found his mates boat running flat out right at us without any lights on or anyone at the helm.
Scary shit as we fired up the old Evinrude and had to cut the anchor rope to avoid being driven over.
As the boat passed us Dad shone the spottie at the other boat to reveal 2 people hunched over in the cabin as the boat hurtled toward the sandy bank.

Long story short we followed the boat into the bank to find it beached with the motor still screaming.
Dad jumped our over the gunnel of our boat, waded through ankle deep water and stepped inside his mates boat to see what was wrong.
He called out his mates name after cutting the engine and then realised he had stepped straight through the side of the boat.
His mate came out of his stupor (in shock) but the guys son (about my age) was hysterical...
Turns out the lad was pulling a good snapper to the boat when they saw a large shark trying to pinch it.
Instead of letting the shark get the fish he lifted it inside the boat.
The shark, reportedly a White, came out of the water after the fish, landed on the gunnel and tore it to the water line, before swimming off in disgust.
The poor kid must have been able to smell its breath it was that close.

True story and makes me shudder each time I see an old Bellboy half cabin...
Dad still has one of the teeth left imbedded in what was left of the gunnel and it is about 2 inches long :o

[agnes_jack]

Rich
Holy s%$t :o :o :o :o :o

Tony :o

[firetruck]

I was doing a some work up at Coconut Is. in the Torres Strait and managed to go fishing with one of the local ladies. Anyway we walked out over a some sand/ rock (at that time ankle/ knee deep) covered area to the fringing reef.

Anyway after running out of bait, fresh cray tails (can you believe it!), she decided to break the necks of the fish and use their guts as bait. Meanwhile the tide was coming in and we were standing in about waist high water. Anyway i got a couple of decent hits and thought they were good fish but i soon found out they were jut reef sharks as they started to show up everhwere.

They weren't very big, maybe 1-1.5m, but there were about 6 or seven them and they were circling us and were pretty cheeky as they would come only a couple of meters away from us. I suggested we leave as the tide was continuing to rise (close to chest deep), and i needed to change my underwear. She actually wanted to fish a little longer but i was pretty keen to get out of there, plus we had a long wade back through a lot of water.

[Brissyguy]

Yeah scary shit Tony...
South Aus breed some big buggas and they all seem to OD on cranky pills lmao...

A trip out to the Swains one year saw a mate and I the last two to sign on with 14 other club members.
We wernt club members of this social club (all non regular fishos) and were treated like leppers lol.
Day one and we were near a big lagoon with the water like a Mill Pond.
All three dory's were launched but as we were outsiders we didnt get a shot.
About 8am and before brekky all three dorys were fishing bommies inside the lagoon (high tide) when a largish Tiger decided to play bumper cars with all three.
He was rubbing and bumping each boat in turn leaving the occupants all scared shitless lmfao.
Days 2 through 7 the mate and I had a tinny each to ourselves lol.
End of day 8 there were 40 knott squalls all the way home.
The mate and I had free beer out the back whilst most of the green faced club members poured copius amounts of personal burley into the sea.
My mate and I came home with plenty of fillets and some good whole fish as well.

[agnes_jack]

Rich
ROFLMFAO ;D ;D ;D ;D
That will teach em to be unsociable!

Cheers, Tony

[NQCairns]

When I was around 20 or so I used to do a lot of spear fishing with one very keen mate mainly. We were making the slog back to the headland from the rocky outcrop off hastings point northern NSW, each with fish in tow when my mate swam right over the top of me and kept on going (he said later that was warning enough, no time to stop, and besides I was faster), shortly after this his fish bag tried to pass me but got caught and twisted up in the prongs of my hand spear (which I was trailing backwards).
I stopped and started pulling back against my mate who was 20m ahead still going for it hard against the tugs, then his line just went slack. When I got further along here was his weight belt with the line attatched on the ocean floor. I twigged straight up that he had got a shark spook and me tugging just panicked him that much more (was the plan :D).
I then had the job of towing his fish with 2 weight belts back to shore, every now and then needing to stop and clear my mask of water as fits of laughter overtook as my imagination got the better of me. nq

[Brissyguy]

LMFAO NQ [smiley=2thumbsup.gif]

Poor bugga must have been shitting in his wetsuit when you pulled on that line lol.
Does he still call you mate ???

Cheers,
Rich.

[agnes_jack]

NQ
CLASSIC ;D ;D ;D ;D

Regards, Tony

[Hutcho]

;D these are great!! #:D ;D.

Carn Tony, don't be shy, i'm sure you've got a coupla more stories to share. And Rich, you too! When I tell my partner she'll never wanna step foot in the water again, she is scared witless of the men in grey suits.
Me too I gues, i remember my heart racing when I was a junior lifesaver in Townsville and we used to paddle out on the big rescue boards to the shark net and jump "on the other side" of the net.....one day my "friends" started to paddle off and left me and another bloke to climb over the net and swim about 100m before they had to stop because of laughing so hard.... >:(. We had a few quiet words to them after that. We used to hear the older blokes from the club take out the rubber ducky at night time and shoot the sharks that got caught in the net, so we knew that sharks often visted the area. Not cool.

hutcho ;)

[Gorilla_in_Manila]

As a teenager I used to go out hand spearing fairly regularly with various mates. One of the greatest joys was to wait until a mate has all his concentration on a fish that he's seen in a hole or has had a couple of goes diving down to and missed, and is sort of oblivious to where you are. You then swim around behind him and sneak up and grab his leg. Never seen someone move so fast. ;D We all had our turn of course and I was got as often as I gave. The good side of this was that we always had an eye out for each other (making sure some bastard wasn't about to get you). ;)
Not a good idea to try it on guys with cocked guns or with the rubber stretched on a handspear though.

Got a severe attack of the shark willies one day. Me and a mate were swimming out to a wreck to do a bit of handspearing. Wreck was about 200m offshore and there was all this spore or algae in the water that cut visability down to about 2 - 4 ft, but it looked like it cleared up out at the actual wreck itself so we thought it would be ok out there.
We swam out and got to about 150m from shore when my mate turns around suddenly with eyes like dinner plates, and goes "What was THAT?"
"What was what?" says I casually, thinking he is just trying to spook me.
"That big thing that just swam past about 4ft in front of us!" he screams.
"Didn't see anything."
But his eyes didn't get any smaller and he must have worked out that I thought he was having me on. Then the decission was made that it would just be wasting time hanging around explaining to me, so he just swam over the top of me heading a 100mile an hour toward shore.
So I'm now realising he really must have seen something and so I start looking around in the water and heading for shore. Now that I had the willies, it just got worse and worse. The more I tried to see through the crap in the water, the more I would think of how a 20ft shark with the mouth the size of a 44 gallon drum could be 4ft away from me and I wouldn't know. Rekon I would have given the thorpedo a run for his money over the last 100m.
I caught up with this mate about 2 years ago, which is about 20years after that day we went handspearing. Since we were yarning about the good old days, I asked him if he remembered that day. My mates eyes went wide again and it was clear he remembered it like yesterday - must have really got the fright of his life. I'm glad I didn't actually see anything that day!

[basserman]

great thread tony almost wetting my paints in laghter and fear! ;D
my old man was diving in port philip bay one day when i was very young he and his mate had been diving for a couple of hours when my mum all of a sudden started catching heaps and heaps of baby white pointers (no regulations back then so all ended up with slit thorghts) no more than 1/2 a hour later both my father and his mate surfaced all white and with out there usaly bag of scollops :-[ when my mum asked what was up they just said it was time to go home
it wasn't till later that they told mum that when they looked up they could see a white pointer curcling the boat and was larger than the boat (21foot pride montaner)
they where pinned to the bottom by the big girl and wasn't till they where starting to run low on the O that they decided ether make a run and hope for the best or sufrecate waiting!
he is/was a diving instrutor and in the army and let me tell you it scared him enoght to put him off diving for near a year :o

on a lighter one i was bass fishing right up amounst some rappeds on the macleay river at kempsey last year when we hooked a med (both thought as we saw it around 35cm) Bass got it almost to the boat when out of the weed come a 2 1/2foot bull shark and chomped our poor bass to bits but we where lucky enoght to get the lure back
the scary thing is how many poeple go swimming here including us just not that day! ;D

[Local_Guy]

i was out fishing with my father one day and we had a floating pillie 20m behind the boat. saw this thing swimming up calmly and swallowed the bait. it was a 6ft tiger shark.
anyway. i wound it in as if it was a whiting... didn't put up a fight or anything. this was on 60lb line mind u.
wound it up along side the boat and said "there's no way i'm bringing this fish into the boat while it's still green", as i said that it turned it's head swam off at a bit of a hurry and no sooner i said to my father "when i get this fish in i'm going to claim it's teeth" did the boody shark bite through the wire trace...

oh well. till next time.

[imnotoriginal]

These are great stories guys, though it makes me very nervous about hopping in the salty stuff.
Joel

[Al_Macka]

re:- shark tales
3 boats fishing off lennox point,in mackeral season, George Greenough included, local fisherman and sharkcatcher legand ............... During a good mackeral session liveys getting smashed by a sizeable mako he was rotating between the 3 boats whilst not taking hooked fish , luved every new bait put back in the water mainly pike. New jigger put down as we all no pike luv rolling up $5 jiggers into a ball , mackeral hammered the ensuring tangle , absolutley seized old egg beater on the bait rod...........................
If u eva fished with timber hand spools u will relate 2 this story , with burnt out egg beater on deck , got the big mackeral hit , whilst trying to air grab the air bourne spool , a black dot flashed past me , then the leap and twist of the mako behind the boat, and the inevitble happened , just shooked the head again.
Whilst rerigging looked round and something was missing , but wasnt sure wat it was..............
Within 2 min Pete behind me got hooked up with the mako , brought in watz left of his line, and yelled out look wat I scored. When i realized wat it waz i said he could keep it..................
Still a talking point at times [smiley=gossip.gif]

[Al_Macka]

it waz my egg beater [smiley=laola.gif] [smiley=beadyeyes.gif]

[Al_Macka]

tony ...
ya opened PANDORA`S BOX Here brother ,we stomp on thier playground ...... We retrieve our boats they liv there ........

[straddie]

Will happily go toe to toe with a guy no matter how big he is, but sharks scare the bejeezes out of me now. :o

Several times been in the surf on an outside bank in water between hip and chest deep to see a munchie come along the out side. Quick retreat back through the gutter or back along the bank to shore with eyes not leaving the dark shape rounding the bank into the gutter gets the blood pumping a little.

Also used to help out some pro's when I was a young fella. One haul for fantail mullet had a few stunned fish getting sucked up by big kings as they drifted out into deeper water. Young and stupid me (I'm not young anymore) decided I was going to try and catch them with a hand scoop, wade out where a few fans are still floating and watch the kings shit and take off. Damn I must have spooked em I think. Turn around to head back to the beach, then think nah I will give it another try, turning back towards the water and theres two whalers where I had been standing :o

Another one helping the pro's, had been watching a big school of sea mullet with some big shapes moving through them every now and then, like you see happening with the baitfish at times. Shot goes out on a steep beach, so a few of us go into the water up to our knecks standing on the lead line to try and keep it down a little. The usual bump bump bump of fish hitting the net, mixed in with big bangs as well ??? wow must be something big in there. As the bag gets close theres a seven foot plus whaler in there, plus on later inspection 7 or 8 massive holes in the side nets where big things went through :o

The whaler got dragged up on the beach for its jaws to be cut out. Vividly remember opening up the guts which contained, 22 big mullet, 2 tailor, 1 whole sand crab and the flipper of a big green sea turtle. Not even a small mark on any of the fish that were inside it.

[agnes_jack]

I was having a snorkel in round hill creek about 2-3 years ago, just in front of the 1770 store. And spotted a turtle laying on the bottom. The poor thing was a very pale yellow in color, quite a large turtle roughly 3-4 ft long. As I got closer he began to swim off very slowly, so slow I managed to swim over and hold one of his flippers. On closer inspection I found that he had a near perfect imprint showing virtually every tooth mark of what was obviously a tiger shark bite. The mark was about 500mm across and the shell was crushed on one side. That got the adrenallin running and the eyes looking in all directions at once!

A few weeks later I was snorkelling up towards the mouth of the creek and spotted another turtle swimming very slowly in the main channel this one had one of its front flippers missing, I could tell that the wound was very recent as there was still bits of vein or tendon haging out of the wound. I kept swimming up the channel and a few hundred metres further on there was the flipper lying on the bottom of the creek! This, on thinking about it later may have been an injury caused by a boat, but may not have been too!

Tony :o :o :o

[Brissyguy]

And you still snorkel around there Tony :o :o :o

Cheers,
Rich.

[agnes_jack]

Yeah Rich
I've been snorkeling since I was 8 years old, seen quite a few sharks and never been bothered by them, but I do have a lot of respect for them too.
Having said that, Theres a first time for everything! I guess its part of the attraction to underwater, the adrenallin buzz you get when something scares the bejeezus out of ya! Nowadays I dont spear a lot of fish, I look more than anything and then go back with my fishing rod. I feel the odds of being bitten are very slim until you spear a fish, then the whole scene changes dramatically!

# # # # # # # Regards, Tony :)

P.S. I dont eat flake, Hopefully if I dont eat them they wont eat me! Hopefully :-/

[Gorilla_in_Manila]

If things were a bit slow when out handspearing around wrecks, we'd sometimes shoot a little butter bream or something and hold it down near the hole where a couple of wobbygongs lived in the wreck. They'd nearly always come out and eat it off the end of the spear and surprised us how strong even a little 4ft placid shark can be when it gets a bleeding fish in its mouth.
But the weirdest thing happened one day. Was out in the middle of the bay on a reef. We used to paddle out there on skis and anchor to the reef and then swim around spearing. Anyway, swam up toward this sort of ridge one day, and this bream pops up from the other side, so I nailed it with my gun. The weight of the spear took the fish back over the ridge and down into the gully behind. I swim up to the ridge and was about to haul it back to me, when this 6ft nurse comes cruising up the gully. I retreated back to just the other side of the ridge and wasn't about to pull a bleeding struggling fish toward me. Wasn't feeling to good about the situation with only a discharged gun in my hand, I can tell you. Anyway, the nurse just slowly swims up the gully within 2 ft of this struggling bleeding fish, and just cruises on by without seeming to give it a second look.
Maybe the spear put it off, maybe it was just full or not hungry in the middle of the day, but certainly didn't rip into some sort of crazed feeding frenzy at the first sign of blood.
Cheers
jeff

[Brissyguy]

Wow thats wierd Jeff, and certainly goes to show sharks are not just an eating and shitting machine after all.

Tony,
LMFAO.. I have the same deal with Crocs lol...

Cheers,
# # # # # Rich.

[agnes_jack]

Jeff
I used to live down on the south coast of NSW at Merimbula, where I did my scuba course. The instructer down there was diving with a friend somewhere near the wharf. As they where swimming along, they had a school of silver drummer in front of them. As they approached a ledge, the drummer swam over and down into the gully on the other side. The instructors mate followed the fish over the ledge and as he did a wobby came straight up out of the gully ramming the diver in the chest and knocked the wind out of him it hit that hard! We assume that the wobby had been sitting below watching the drummer swim over and decided he was going to grab the next one as it came over the ledge, but rammed the diver instead! He had a fairly decent bruise to show for it which indicates how hard it hit.

Tony

[Gorilla_in_Manila]

Tony,

Yeah the wobbies can go for it if they decide they want a feed. Seen about a 5 footer swimming around out at the middle reef with the tail of what looked like a 4lb brown groper sticking out of its gob. Must have only just fit in its mouth. They certainly dont just cruise around looking for pipis or scraps.

Came nose to nose with the biggest wobbie I have ever seen one afternoon in a little gutter on the beach just across from our house. My old man came home from work with a set of goggles and snorkel one day and gave them to me, so I just went over to try them out. Standing in the gutter up to my waist, and just sort of dived forward after fitting the mask. First thing I see after the bubbles cleared off the glass is a wobbies head about 2 ft across and about 2 ft infront of my nose. Bastard must have been about 6or7ft and was just lying there on the sand. :o :o :o
Think I invented a new swimming stroke that afternoon - call it the backward, face down, surface scurry. About the only bit of me that wasn't going in reverse would have been my sphincter I rekon. ;D
No worries about it actually hurting me, just the shock of it. Also, if I had taken about 2 more steps when first wading out, I would have stepped on it, which it might have been less happy about.

Quite surprising what is getting around near peoples feet on popular swimming beaches that you never know about unless you throw on a mask and have a bit of a look.

Cheers
Jeff

[agnes_jack]

Jeff LOL ;D
When I was quite young I managed to aquire a 12 guage powerhead for my speargun. Of course the first thing I wanted to do was test it. So the next time my mate and I went for a dive I found a similar size wobby to the one you mention. It was laying on the sand under a ledge. The ledge was about 3ft high, 15ft long and curved over about 1.5ft on the front edge forming a bit of a tunnel. I swam in the end facing the wobby and let him have it! The effect was quite similar to being in the barrel of a shotgun when fired! My mask was smashed back into my nose, I bashed my head on the top of the ledge, and managed to back out of the ledge and floated more than swam back to the surface, much wiser for the experience!

Tony :o :-[ :-[

[blaze]

Not shark but
Sking one day in front of the deep water port at Stanley when the ski rope broke. Mate wave and signaled back in 5 mins (time to slip back to the beach and pick up a new rope) while treading water waiting I turned to see what was happening on the wharf, bugger me, a feeding frenzy of barracouta, the fishermen were casting near me and hooking onto bloody 3 foot couta flat out, I sat in the water to scared to move a mussell and I think it took my mate an hour to get that new rope, did not use the rope just got back in the boat
cheers
blaze

[Brissyguy]

LMFAO Tony... :D :D :D ;D

What a visual ...

Rich.

[basserman]

yeh i recon i would much prefure a swin with sharks than a school of leather jackets or taylor or any of those vicious toohty fish! ::)
i recon if they were as big as sharks we would think diffrent
the times i have seen a school of taylor just rip schools of bait fish apart in minutes or the times i go outside fishing and almost every rig gets biten through by the chinamen leatherjackets!

[Brissyguy]

Picture this...
Younger brother sneaks off with friends against parents orders and watches first Jaws movie.
Two weeks later 5 year old brother and I are swimming at the local foreshore, sun is shining, seagulls cawing (Mine, Mine, Mine)lol and the guy in the shark tower is kicked back in his seat relaxing.
Suddenly younger brother starts yelling "SHARK, SHARK, SHARRRRRRRRRK" !!!
and starts climbing my back.
With little brother nearly permanently affixed to the top of my head I wade ashore as fast as I can to the constant clang of the bell from the shark tower.
There were people screaming and tearing the water to a foam.

Back on the beach about an hour later after the all clear from the shark tower, people, including us gingerly venture back into the water.
Suddenly over the top of the laughing and splashing goes my little brother again "Shark, SHARK, SHARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRK"!!!
Again the clanging bell, people screaming and throwing little kids behind them as sacrifices as they tear their way to the beach.
This time I stop the brother from reaching my head and make him run/wade behind me and he goes hysterical screaming louder and louder and pointing at... at... at.... HIS BLOODY SHADOW.......!!!!!

Extremely embarrassed parents ban us from going to the beach ever again after being publicly humiliated by the beach patrol guy. :-/

Looking back now it is as funny as hell and a story my younger brother threatens me with death if ever I tell it in public. #:D

[basserman]

we woun't tell brissy!!! ;D

[imnotoriginal]

Classic!
Joel

[Outsider]

Names have been changed to protect the innocent...

12 & 7's parents used to take their two boys to Straddie every school holidays. 12 and 7 were having a great time that day, bodyboarding at Cylinder Beach. They were the furtherest out when 12 happened to look up at the headland 200m away between sets to see Mum and Dad waving. 12 called to his little bro 7 and they start waving back as kids do.

12 is keeping an eye out for waves while waving when he notices the "whump whump whump" #of a chopper coming round the headland. Yellow and Red Rescue Chopper cruises past, throws a big U-turn and comes to a hover just in front of them, guys in it waving excitedly.

12 & 7 think this is just great so they're waving back and laughing...crazy chopper guys playing with the kids in the surf. 12 looks back at the headland to see if Mum and Dad can see all the fun they're having out there.

12 has trouble picking Mum and Dad out of the growing crowd of 20-30 people gathering on the headland...obviously to watch the crazy chopper men....right?!?

12 looks back up at the crazy chopper men and is just about to start waving like an idiot again when he notices the guy in the harness at the side door of the chopper making a sign with his hands - side on, holding them straight out infront of himself, one arm under the other in a circle, moving them apart and bringing them back together...like a big mouth opening and closing.

12 thought that was real funny. 12 thought that the crazy chopper man had cracked a pretty good joke and #laughed out loud...but just the once.

12 had a "moment of clarity" and crapped his boardies. 12 turns to 7 and can see it in 7's eyes he's already worked it out and was struggling with the "run away" or "burst into tears" instinct but says "shark" anyway...more as reflex than anything. I know for a fact that 12 will never forget the look on his brothers face and especially in his eyes as the tears started welling.

12 has the "run away" battle under control and starts paddling like never before...head down on the board, eyes screwed tightly shut, 5 right behind him. 12 didn't dare look back till his board hit the shoredump.

Parents came running, huggs and kisses all round. Big group gathers and everyone seems relieved. Chopper's still hanging around so everyone heads up to the point to have a look.

School of sharks (30-40) 2-3m long covering the size of an Olympic swimming pool hanging around the edge of the outer break.

Apparently they didn't get excited until 12 & 7 started thrashing away in the water.... #

12 never found out what type they were...and is happier for it.



12 looks back up at the chopper

[Gorilla_in_Manila]

hey 12 ;), you have just reminded me of another with all that waving.

My dad went out fishing for tailor one day on the ski. Huge swell and waves from the SE coming around the North tip of the local cape rocks, breaking and running off almost due west. Dad starts getting tailor in the back of the white water and along the northern edge and then sees his mate over on the rocks casting his heart out. Dad gives him the thumbs up, he gives back the thumbs down coz he couldn't reach the fish.
Next thing, this guys climbing down the front of the rocks and holding his sholder bag and rod in one hand, starts sidestroking across a 10m wide gutter beside the rocks and gets onto a sand bank with water up to his hips. Puts a knot in the strap of the shoulder bag and he's away casting into the good water. Big Yabba Dabba Dooo everytime he hooks up as usual.

So the old fella's fishing the northern side of where the waves were running through, and his mate is on the southern side fishing to the back of where the waves run off with about 50m of rolling white water separating them. Then the old man looks over and notices a bloody great fin in the channel behind where his mate is standing with another smaller fin about 4 ft behind it. First of all he thought it was a dolphin with her calf, but then he sees that the back fin moving from side to side. :o

So then he starts waving and pointing and yelling shark at his mate, who by this time has about half a dozen 3lb tailor in his bag with cracked necks. Mate starts waving back and laughing and giving it a few more yabba dabba dooos obviously not hearing too well over the roar of the surf. Dad couldn't get over to where he was, but in the bit off a lull between sets got over close enough to cup his hands and yell SHARK at the top of his lungs. This got the attention of his mate finally and he sarts looking around over near dad and yelling Where, Where? Next set is heading Dad's way but just had time to do a looping sort of point to behind where his mate is standing, before heading back out to safer water.

Mates face suddenly turns completely WHITE! Turns around and see this 8ft shark about 10m behind him in the gutter between him and the safety of the rocks. PANIC!!! Out come the fish one by one and get chucked as far as possible, then the blood soaked bag gets chucked as well, forgetting he had all his spare spinners. Shark doesnt move! Sort of sits there saying, thanks for that mate, I'll get them LATER.

So mate is now stuck there shitting himself, up to his waist in water and trying to work out if he is better to javalin his rod back to the rocks, or try and hold the butt and reel in front of his nuts. ;D

Fins disappear. :o :o Mate still stuck thereafter about 10 minutes trying to work out suburged rocks from shadows, and occassional glances over his shoulder hoping my old man would somehow be able to paddle in and save him. Finally the willies must have just got to much and the rod gets chucked over on the rocks and mate swims 15m in the water and keeps swimmig about 10m up the face of the rocks and well away from the water. #;D ;D Dad's in stiches over all this now that he's safe. After about 15 minutes calming down, dad see his mate up and casting again. Dads thinking, he's wasting his time casting around that gutter, but mate keeps it up for about an half an hour after which dad heads home. Dad learns later that mate finally twigged he had about $20 worth of spinners in the bag and spent an hour casting at it and trying to hook it as it swirld around the foamy water. Didn't; get it. Rekons that was the most scared he has ever been.

[Brissyguy]

LMFAO Jeff and 12 ;D

[Darncer]

Stupid work - sorry to bring this back to life - but it is bloody excellent and you have to love the yarns!!!!

A couple of things:

A mate of mine that I fish with is an Irish guy, and arrived off the plane in Sydney about three years ago with about 6 Irish lads. First thing they do after getting somewhere to live is to head off to Manley and strut around for the ladies and go for a swim.....
Picture this, two very pale Irish lads, trying to attract the opposite sex with their sexual prowess. Anyway, off two of them go for a swim and decide to really try and impress the ladies by swimming out several hundred meters from the shore. Anyway, a few minutes later and the beach becomes alive with sunbathers and swimmers screaming at them, waving and the like and the lads catch the word 'SHARK'!!!!! Well, both of them start doing their best impression of Jesus (both being good Catholic boys) and breaking all swimming/sprinting records and finally they hit the shore - only for one of them (not my mate - apparently) keeps on running - all the way back to their digs. It took him a week to go back on the sand after that and he has since gone back to Ireland where he is even nervous about swimming in the local lochs!!!

2 - want to know how to really piss off a rich Melbournian? Tell him that just last night, you caught a shark off the very beach he is about to go swimming off - actually saw some guy in Brighton (Vic) do an about turn as he was about to go for a swim after an angler told him this - no fish to prove it, although I hear that these bad boys are reguarly caught at night on the high tide off the beach - LMFAO.

[Darncer]

Just a thought to you guys that run this site - fishing tales would make a great addition to this site - it's not just about landing them!!!! (although I'm the first to admit that it bloody well helps!!!!)

[Al_Macka]

Darncer
2nd that , thought i mite get a BITE from pic`s attached 2 atticle submitted earlyer..... anyway
I`m new 2 this site ... SHARK TAILS, when fishing offshore is so REEL ..... Dread tha thought of hav`n 2 swim if situation EVER poked it`s head up....
Fish`n tha 32ftms sat , witnessed what 4 year`s i all way`s wanted 2 do on a stinking hot day , watched 3 youger guy`s jump over ,BALLSY work i thought when so many times . when pull`n quality or any fish tha man in tha gray suit just appead from nowhere .ala ,mate they luv boat shadow`s ,evan better when food is delivered by egar fisherman... anyway bilge pump on transom 4 livey tank soon converts 2 shower ....As aeroplane pilot`s say 2 parachuter`s ....
WHY JUMP OUT OF A PERFECTLY GOOD CRAFT..
I under stand divers in close . BUT 32FTM`S of LENNOX ..... WHOOOO WEEEE......

CHEER`S ALL

MACKA ...