Liam's Big Catch!
08 January 2012 | Smoke House Bay, Great Barrier Island, New Zealand
By Liam
When we were in Smoke House Bay, Dave (s/v Riada II), taught my mom how to fish. One early morning, my mom took my dad and me fishing.
We got up early and dingied to the mussel farm that was about a 20 minute ride from Gromit. I drove the dingy, while my parents trailed fishing lines. We didn't have any luck fishing like that. When we arrived at the mussel farm, we tied up to one of the floating buoys and my mom started chopping up 'kinna' which are sea urchins, and throwing them into the water. This puts out a scent for the Red Snapper.
Red Snappers swim near the bottom, so my parents put their lines down there hoping the Red Snappers would smell the kinna and bite. And you know when you have a Red Snapper because it's not a little nibble, nibble. He chomps down in one big bite. I was fishing near the surface, between 4-12 feet down with little tiny hooks baited with mussels off the the mussel buoys. It is ok to take the mussels off the buoys, but not from the vertical lines that hang down.
My parents just sat there waiting for fish, while I brought in tons of them. I bet I must have had 13 or 14, but some got off the hook. At first, mom was baiting my hook with mussels, but then I started doing it myself. As soon as I put my line in the water, all the fish, about 10 or so, came around my baited hook and in about 30 seconds I had a fighting fish. Then I brought my rod over to where my mom could grab the line and put the fish into the boat. After about two hours, of me pulling in fish and my parents getting nothing and I mean nothing, we went back to Gromit to eat breakfast and then into shore to clean and fillet the fish 'I' caught!!!!!!!
Smoke House Bay pictures now posted in the Photo Gallery. Click on the small pictures to make them larger.