February 28, 2006 Opal Mining Update - No 58 New Venue for Fishing down South.

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It has rained here all day for the first day of the month, so we did not get to put the boat in the water, but before I could do that I have to get the outboard motor leg an oil change, also change he 2 spark plugs, I do this every year even we only use it for about 8 weeks while we are on holidays, better to make sure than break down out at sea, I have all of the rods geared up ready for fishing. I took the boat to the Marine Mechanic and when he dropped the oil from the leg it had water mixed in with it, the seals in there had gone and looks like they had gone sometime last year when I was in Queensland, so I could not put new oil in and go out on the water knowing I had a problem. The mechanic has ordered 2m new seals for it and should be here in the morning the 3rd, I will take the boat to him around 8:30 and drop it off, to get the job done, also I have no power to the Fish Finder, otherwise known as a depth sounder, I have just put a new battery in the boat and everything else that requires 12 volt electric power works, so it may just be a fuse or a loose connection, will know tomorrow when he checks it out for me, also grease up the leg and I will be ready for a trial run on the water. Bad news again, the fish finder has had it, gone, pooped, shit itself for some reason while it was in its snug little box in the spare bedroom for 10 months, why I have no idea, it was working right up till I took it off the boat and packed it away in Queensland, so again the Gremlins have struck, I have an old very old one that I used to use in the dingy years ago that is limited to telling me the depth and if any fish are around, it runs off big square flashlight batteries and I have checked it and it still works OK, the only reason I brought it was to try and sell it down here for a few dollars, so I am glad I brought it and will use it till I can buy a new one, next week I hope in Port Lincoln, trouble is that everything is so dear there, like buying gold bars. Also the Marine Radio is out of action as well, don't they make anything like they used to that lasts for a few years, like this old Humming Bird Fish Finder of mine, lucky for me the Professional Fisherman and the Oyster people dont use the VHF Radio here much anymore, so I have bought a CDMA Cell Phone which works in this area out in the bay, was thinking of buying a cell phone in Coober Pedy when I got back for on the Opal Fields incase I was to break down with the mining truck, so I had to get one early, I will not be replacing the radio in the future, looks like the cell phones and Satellite Phones have taken over, hard to keep up with the change in modern technology today. I have been out one day fishing, exactly one week after we got here and I went out with my friend Peter, who works a claim near me on the 11 mile field, he said he would show me the hot spots, just an excuse for me to take him out fishing, the weather was not good as the wind was up and it got worse as the day got on, lucky for Pat she stayed at home and just let us two guys go out for the first time, we managed to catch 4 legal size King George Whiting, plus a couple of other small fish that was legal size, not worth taking a photo of at this stage, will try again in a couple of days. Pat and I went out on Monday the 6th, was not a bad morning, did not hear the weather forecast for today but took a chance as the sun was shining, there were a few clouds around, but that does not mean anything, here an Oyster Boat is passing us on its way to work, we will be showing you some of the Oyster Leases later in the newsletter, but right now we are on our way to what is called the Brothers, which is a pair of small Islands some 5 miles out in Coffin Bay, Peter took me there day before yesterday so we will try again today to see if they are still on the bite there, most of the stuff you catch is undersize and you have to throw them back, the legal size length here King George Whiting is 30 centimeters or a foot in the old scale.

This is pod of Dolphins feeding near the boat, they are moving around and the Brothers is to left of photo and we have been here for about 10m minutes and not a bite and as these are around doe's not help so I am about to pull the anchor and look for another spot to try, by the way we are only fishing here in 8 foot of water, some of the places we will be trying over the next few days will only be 3 feet deep, not much chance of catching anything big, but hope to Gummy Shark or 2 while we are here.

This day we went out the wind was up and very overcast again, there is a bit of a chop on the water, we were catching a lot of these whiting but all small ones, this is a spot called the Tape Weeds and we look for large sandy patches to fish in as the whiting feed on the sand and along the edges of this weed also they can take cover in them if need be.

Here is Pat, looks like she is freezing, not the best conditions for fishing, but in fact a small squall has just gone through, you can see rain on the window screen, it is not that hot but not cold, we were these wet jackets most of the time when we are going out if there is a swell up as here the wind blows across the bow of the boat causing a lot of spray to come over the top, when it is like this I normally only travel about 11 knots per hour or we would take a pounding and take on a lot of water, so I slow down, the boat also has a bilge pump in so I can get rid of the water in weather like this or if it rains as a lot of water can get in the boat in a short time during heavy rain, so a bilge pump is a must.

This is the day after the photo above, completely different weather today, not a breath of wind and a calm sea, today we are going to try another spot we have been told about, called Palm Beach some 11 miles out in the bay, we have to go near the Oyster Leases, but as I am still learning this area and this is my time out this way, I have missed a marker so I am in amongst the leases, to close as it turns out as I am in 2 foot of water, even less in some spots.

There are many of these Oyster Leases here, I have no idea if this one belongs to the same company as the one above but is right next door to it, must be millions of Oysters here, if you look at the bottom of photo you can see the floor of the bay, some these big Oyster Boats can operate in these shallow waters as they have what is called an inboard/outboard motor, they suck water in the motor and then pump it out through a small opening like a jet engine, this allows them to operate in shallower waters than boats with outboards like me, so I assume that these leases belong to such a boat.

This is another one that I thought I would take a photo of, as they are not all the same setup, this lease is somewhat different in the way it looks, not as neat an tidy as the first two, the oysters are kept in plastic containers, must have a proper name but I dont know it, the people who work at this game earn every penny they make as they stand in the water all the time they are working and in all weathers and all year round, winter and summer.

So today being good weather and all, of course what is good for us in not always good for the fish, or fishing, so today the fish are not really on the bite, we have been moving quite a bit and getting no bites in most areas that we have tried, then we find a spot where we catch a few, this is the first one we have caught of this type here, we have caught it before, it is a member of the Goatfish family, (locals call it a Red Mullet) you can tell this is a Goatfish by the 2 whiskers hanging down from its chin, good eating but not a lot on this little fish, but kept it anyway as there is no legal size on this species of fish and legal size fish right now are extremely hard to find.

Pat today decided to keep count of the fish she caught, lucky she did not do this yesterday dont think she could counted that high, anyway today she caught 17 and I will I did start to keep count then I didn't, so I have no idea but would be around Pats I should think and we only came home with 4, but I started crabbing late in the morning and we got 10, the fish were King George Whiting-2, Flathead-1 and one Goatfish.

Thought I would take a photo of the Sand Crabs from the back as they have these black spots on there backs, they are a smaller crab then what we are used to which is called the Blue Swimmer, we are allowed to catch 40 each of these per day, up to a limit of 120 per boat regardless of how many people are in he boat, but I have to tell you that 40 is a lot of crab and a lot of work cooking and cleaning.

Here are the crabs ready for cooking, I do it a bit different from most people that you talk to, the way you cook crabs is first to get some sea water in which you caught them in, this I forgot this time and did not water to take the boat off to go back to the boat ramp for some, so used sea salt in the tap water, not as good but a good backup, then you bring the water to the boil and then put the crabs in and bring back to the boil an cook for 8 minutes, then take out and put in cold water to stop the cooking process and cool them down so you can start eating them or like me pull them apart to clean them out and then pull them apart to take the meat out, this also makes the water very dirty if cooking more than one batch and would have to change the water between batches.

What I do is take the shell off the crab and most of the insides come away with the top shell, just a little bit of cutting with a knife, where the mouth is or was, then cut the crab in half and you have what you see above, all clean ready for cooking, this keeps the water clean and is quicker, now I bring the salt water to the boil, put the half crabs in and cook for 5 minutes and remove putting in cold water to stop the cooking process, and everything is clean and ready for pulling the meat out, I was suppressed to find that these little crabs are absolutely full of meat and it is a sweeter meat than the Blue Swimmer, so we will now be trying to get more of these crabs as I have a vacuum packing machine with me this year which will make a huge difference to the taste of the crab meat or fish that is going to being frozen for some time. This was a real good day for fishing, for us anyway, there was just enough chop on the water at the start anyway, got a bit rougher towards lunchtime as the wind picked up some, we had to move around again until we got onto some fish, this is the 3rd spot that we were catching fish in, when they go off the bite we moved and found another spot, but we were here for a while and so these other boats moved in near us to fish, we caught 14 Whiting for the day so a new record for us, we are allowed 24, (12 each) this spot her is around 12 or so nautical miles out from Coffin Bay, we are in 10 feet of water here and as you can see the weather is beautiful for fishing, being a Sunday, you get some of the locals out fishing, during the week you would not get boats near each other like this, not that they are that close I zoomed in on them for this shot.

This hill in the back ground I have called the Volcano, the correct name is Mena Hill, still looks more like a Volcano shape to me, anyway this is one of the landmarks that I use in going out through the narrow passage we have to navigate to go out fishing, we are fishing about 1.5 to 2 miles around the corner of a place called Point Longnose, the spot above were we are fishing is a small bay and the land you can see in the background is just were the P is in the name Point Longnose on the map below.

This the map of Coffin Bay, did not think that I would be able to take a photo of it on the kitchen table with a flash but it came out pretty good, now you can follow where I am talking about if you want, so far we have fished at the Tape Weed and caught some fish but mostly all small, The Brothers a pair of small Islands, caught a Sting Ray there and saw 5 others and a few small fish, and the next time we go fishing (2 days time) we will trying off that Farm Beach which is about 14 feet deep on low tide and about 2 kilometers or so off the shore and another spot a bit further out that is deeper water about 28 feet or so, where I have been told we can catch bigger King George Whiting, so will have to wait and see, this change over of a new 2nd hand vehicle we have bought is taking a bit of our time and we have to go into Port Lincoln again this next Saturday to get measured up for new reading glasses, who said that holidays was all fun.

This small Oyster Lease is right in close to shore and I thought I would show you how they work on them, standing in the shallow water, the guy has a wet suit on to keep him warm, we find the water temp in about 10 feet of water is at 18.6 degrees surface temp, my fish finder tells me this and a lot of other stuff as well.

This is a what we call a Bowie, other wise know as a puffer fish, I caught this one, the spines are not that sharp looks more menacing than it is, nice looking fish, better than I am used to, took the hook out and threw it back.

Another species here, I have no idea of the name, we have started catching a few of these now we are fishing deeper water, we could eat them, but I am after bigger this this fish and better so we throw them back, pretty fish.

Another Puffer Fish, Pat caught this one and said it looks cute but I think it has a funny face.

The things you see out at sea, we are fishing out from Farm Beach out from that Mt Dutton near some Abalone Farms and this seal turns up, swam around the boat a few times and left, just shows you have to carry the old camera all the time, never know what you will see.

This guy came back after a little while, named him Cheeky, threw him a sardine that I us for bait, he grabbed it and played with it for a few seconds then let it go, was not interested in a dead fish so me must have been waiting for us to catch one then he would have pinched it, but we were not catching anything at that time, in fact we are having a hard time in finding where we can catch a few fish.

We have moved back to the Abalone Farm and I have caught a couple of whiting and had a hook up with a shark, the line got cut by it rubbing along side of its body, then just after I got back here I had this hook up with a shark, this one I landed, you can se the white spots on the top of its body, it is a Gummy Shark, no teeth but has grinding plates like a sting ray. This is Farm Beach, we launch the boat off the beach itself, it is very shallow water here when the tide is in and when it is low tide there is a drop off just where you can see the darker water in the back round, there it drops off into about 5 foot of water so you get into trouble if you back the boat back too far, here Pt is talking to a tourist like us, but is just walking his dog and was asking about the fishing and wanted to see the shark I had caught.

Here you can see the whole beach, nice solid white sand do not have to let the tires down here to drive on the beach, this was our first time here, so was cautious as to not get in any trouble, dont mind getting bogged in the sand, its in or near the water I have to be careful of, until I get to know the area, I have a fair bit of experience driving on beaches from years ago, but every beach is different, so pays to get to know them, so long as there is other people around with 4x4s you can get help, but I do carry my own recovery equipment, and have a PTO winch (power take off) on the new vehicle although I have not used it as yet and dont fully understand the full operation of it as yet but have a person here who will show me how to operate it in the next few days.

This is the other end of the beach and the start of the coast line, there are more small beaches along this coat line, but as far as I know they are not accessible by road and are on private farm land, the road out of here is just in front of the vehicle and to the right where those wheel tracks are going.

This is where they park the vehicles when the boats have been launched, there is a caravan park here and some houses also, so there are a few, very few locals live, right down the beach, well not that far down just looks like it in the photo, there are caravans parked along the beach they belong to Farmers I have been told, they come and live here rent free when it is quite on the farm or the wrong time of the year for what ever they do on the farm, will take a close up photo for the next newsletter.

In this photo you can see the end of Point Longnose (photo above) that is the sandy part in the back ground on the right, just above the guy talking to Pat, will be back here again to fish as it is not far to deep water which is on the right hand side, in side Point Longnose we fish in around 10 to 15 feet of water and in the deeper water it has been in 38 to 60 feet, so there is a chance of catching bigger fish.

This is the poor Gummy Shark, 4 foot 9 inches long and weighed in at almost 10 kilos, (22 lbs) just a baby really, but more my size, can handle this one easy with a bit of a fight, I did as I said above have another hit with a shark that was not a Gummy as this shark as a smooth skin and would not cut the line with it, bit I also had another hit with a shark and I lost that one as well, but by the power they had on pulling they would have been 7 foot or bigger, hope to get some more yet.

Here are the fillets and the 4 whiting, the fillet in the foreground is 34 inches long, you can see the backbone, which is not bone at all, just a figger of speech, now to skin it and cut the bloody bits off and then cut it into small fillets ready for vacuum packing for the freezer, this Gummy Shark is the best shark you can catch here in Australia for eating, we have a few good ones, but this is the best, the meat cooks up a perfect white and is very good eating.

It has been hard for us this to try and catch fish, we did not get in the water for the first week due to the weather, it was raining and cold and then I had had used a lot of water on the way down and found that I had a blown head gasket on the 4x4, this must have happened during the year in Coober Pedy, but as I don't drive many miles while I am there in this vehicle I did not notice, although I did get the radiator re-cored as I found it had 4 leaks in it, which turned out to be a waste of money. So as I had spent enough on the old girl, it was time to cut it loose and look for another vehicle, which I found on the first day of looking which was a surprise, thought it would take longer to find one, which is the white 4x4 Landcruser in the photos above, had to get a bank loan for it, which was better than spending more money on the old one, then we had to get it fitted out with some extras that was needed, Spare Wheel Carrier for the rear bumper, Roof Rack, Radio, Set Covers, Window Tinting, getting the wiring fitted for the car fridges/freezers we have when traveling, Floor Mats etc, this has cost us 11 days in going back into Port Lincoln to get all of this done, so out of 29 days we have only fished for 11 day only. The freezer is not quite half full as yet, but hope to get a lot more fishing in this comming next month, just have to get a electric plug put on the boat to match the one on the back of the new vehicle than I will have brake lights etc again, apart from that we are having a good time and fishing can be hard work when catching them or not as you still have to clean everything of salt water and sand when you get home, so it can be quite tiring, will show you more of how we launch and retrieve the boat on the beach. Again I Hope you have enjoyed this issue and look forward to the next one, hopefully I will have some more good photos to show you in the next issue and maybe some of BIG FISH, I am still hoping that this will be a good year for us, but only time will tell, so stay with us over the next few months and find out what goes on in our part of the world. Stay Tuned for the next Issue, who knows what I will have to report. Until the next issue......... and wish me lots of LUCK. Cya Later, Stuart Bird. To return back to the Archived Page for more Updates click, Here!

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