Fishin' Fashin

Finally, the fashion community is starting to realise the vast potential of fish to make people stylish and irresistible. Here, you can see practical and elegant fish headwear, which two people support - allowing them to split the cost of the hat, as well as enjoying the spirit of camaraderie you only really feel when you are sharing a garment with someone else. In Europe, critics are calling these hats 'the new jeans', so you can expect to see them shortly at all the major fashion houses. As with jeans, it is likely that wearing sneakers with your Prada Duo Fish Hat will be considered an unforgivable faux pas. Be warned!

Hope springs

In this rare shot, we can just make out the gentle salt water fly fisherman (right), pictured alongside the traditional bait fisherman/lure user. Note the thickset, burly frame of the heritage method fisherman, and the tyrannosaurus/prizefighter cut of his shoulders. In comparison, the SWFer is slimmer, more upright, and has the firm, lithe poise of a professional dancer. While many believe that the divide between these factions - separated as much by philosophy as technique - will never truly be closed, this picture is a beacon of hope for a united future.*

* This photograph has been officially inspected, and judged not to have been altered in any way. What you see is one of the very few confirmed shots of cross-species co-habitation recorded in recent times.

SIGH

Dirty water?

A snapper from Auckland's welcoming coastline. Our public transport might be patchy, our Mayor might be lecherous, and our ironic beards might be laughably pretentious, but I won't hear a bad word about our shore fishing.

Front door steps

A couple of chronologically selected snaps taken from Auckland's promenade to the stars and gateway to the kings. The slightly less glamorous parore was a happy accident and like the more desirable subjects was served upon a silver platter to two hungry diners, crumbed, fried and delicious.

Why your sunglasses will eventually divorce you

When I first started hanging around with these beautiful Arnette polaroids, I couldn't get enough of them. We'd hang out all day, and at night I'd polish them carefully and put them lovingly in their case. I took care of my personal hygiene, since I didn't want oil getting on the lenses. We danced, sometimes, just the two of us: no music, no light, just dancing. I never missed a birthday. Over time, we started seeing less of each other. I got a new job and didn't have so much free time. I worked hard and felt like I was doing the right thing by us - we needed the money to keep the comfortable, easy-going lifestyle we wanted. But, in working for the lifestyle, I sacrificed the ability to live that lifestyle. Sometimes we were together, but it was always fleeting: on the way somewhere else. I never had time to clean them anymore. They stopped living in their case. One morning, not so long ago, I woke up and put them on. The lenses had seen too much salt water, and the polarising transfer was coming off in a terrible pock marked pattern. Then, I knew: my neglect, my complacency, had killed what we had. And things would never be the same again.

Moocherati

This handsome beast took a jack mackerel in 5 metres of water, close into the bricks. In his stomach, I found a bait pilchard I'd cast and lost earlier, some crabs, and a stone tablet with an eleventh commandment relating to the inappropriate use of sinkers in shallow water.

Tackle review: OPUS BULL 6000

TACKLE REVIEW: DIAWA OPUS BULL 6000
If you're the kind of puny weakling that gets sand kicked in your face by fishing bullies, this reel could well be for you. With 15kgs of drag, it has a good amount of grunt, and its robust, chunky, bulletproof body will fill you with confidence when you stride onto the rocks to tackle topwater kingfish, kraken, or passing boats. These reels are cheap for the quality they offer, and while they are undeniably mid-range-ish, they perform and last well. I absolutely thrashed one of these bad boys for three years, catching plenty of good fish and dinging it up on the rocks in the process. The Opus Bull 6000 never complained once. The reel still works reasonably well, but the drag pulses at bit at the top end: entirely forgivable considering how much work it's done. I've retired it to a shelf alongside other treasured reels, in the hope that it will breed.

FINAL WORD: 
These reels are a good combination of performance, robust components and affordability. The extra spool seems standard, and is very handy. Buy at least one Opus Bull immediately, before you have time to consider the mortgage or a loved one's birthday.

Rainbow alliance

Releasing a fine rainbow in the Tukituki in Hawke's Bay. This is a river overlooked by many, ignored by some, and unknown to circa 6.98 billion of the world's population. The poor fools.

Autumn reds

A few hours wanderingabout a quiet Hauraki Gulf isle produced this and a handful of similar fish yesterday. All tricked with soft plastics languidly twitched and wound across a sandy bottom in just couple of hands past a fathom of sea, with Gulp curly tail jigging grubs on 1/4oz light bulbs being flavour of the day.

The first fish of the day taken from the top left point of this reef

                                            

A good string puller

Flying fish

For all those deniers who repeatedly and pig-headedly assert that fish aren't slippery in spite of the excellent scientific evidence proving the contrary, here's something that ought to change your mind.

Pike it or not

This shovel-headed croc was hanging around the weed like a skateboarder at a pot party. Every so often I'd see him chasing fish, but for a whole morning I couldn't get him on. I finally tried a flank bait, and he swallowed it like a <insert totally inappropriate comment of your choosing>. He went back in to do pike stuff, like eating ducklings and withdrawing from events at late notice and without giving concrete reasons.

When naming goes sucky

So you're sitting 'round, thinking about what you should call your boat. Several beers later, you settle on this, and paint it on before you sober up. Later, you realise you're a moron.

Brown in a crowd

This brown was holding in shallow, slow water, mooching back and forth along the weed edge like a homeless dude looking for fag ends. There were a number of rainbows in the same area, so pinpointing the brown was a bit like trying to score the pretty girl from amidst a milling bunch of other girls with really really great personalities.

Tackle maintenance

This is my good friend, legendary tackle-smith Ed Williams. He's demonstrating the correct way to use your downtime when the fish aren't biting. You'll notice the rollie ciggers, bottle of water, and loaf of bread, which are all used for different varieties of self gratification during the fishing day. Ed has carefully put his head on the cow track, so he is assured of being woken for the evening rise, when the cows move back into the holding paddock on dusk. It's this sort of attention to detail that's driven Ed to the shiny pinnacle of global fishing.

Vests are IN

This healthy back country rainbow was caught before hair cuts were invented, but slightly after the invention of naff fleecy vests. It was sitting in a fast riffle, nabbing food as it tumbled past, like a fat man on a steep hill at a picnic where people further up the hill have started rolling food past, maybe because they're bored, or maybe they're drunk or something. Further up the hill there was a course on how to write similes that aren't nonsensical - hell of a picnic, you would have loved it. Anyway, this rainbow came across about half a foot, nailed the hair and copper, and headed off through the rocks like he was some sort of weenie douche who'd just discovered JUSTIN FREAKING BEIBER tickets ARE LIKE TOTALLY ON SALE LOL OMG! This fish went back in unharmed, bearing no indelible scars, and slightly wiser, which is where the similarity to Bieber fans begins to fall down.

Bet on red

Every so often the fishing's so hot you could mistake it for Natalie Portman in her underwear. Anyway, that's not what this post is about, although it'd probably get a lot more hits if that was the topic, mainly from dudes who live in their mum's basement and can recite Monty Python while they clock Dungeons and Dragons. Big fan, Natalie, big fan. But back to the fishing: the snapper were high in the water that day, eating pilchards like they'd just discovered they were chocolate infused and gave you the power of invisibility. Everything that went down came back up replaced by a healthy red, except for the times a rambunctious kahawai exercised power of veto. These two fish were caught in successive casts, and came home to play a very key role in a fish dinner with an important guest of honour, my old mate Jimmy Five Bellies.

Autumn in the gulf

Being generous souls means occasionally we take others out to fulfil their snappery dreams, while it is sometimes said that charity helps the recipient with their problem (e.g., not catching any fish), but it doesn't do much to deal with the causes of that problem (e.g., being a ledger rigging shore googan). Fortunately Brendon proved to be quick study and in short order was deftly heaving pilchards about with reckless abandon. Unlike Schapelle Corby we actually deliver and Brendon soon found himself fighting this 64cm chap (a PB for Brendon) which engulfed a whole pilchard in 2 meters of water before promptly depositing himself in a weed line, but with some patience, good angling and smidgen of luck Brendan managed to extract him. On the walk back schools of Kawahai were herding bait fish into the bay so a quick, productive flick with trout spinners was in order.

Hopefully this kind of snapper action can persist through winter.

Snapperazzo

This feisty 58cm snap took the bait a couple of feet under the surface, right at my feet. He was hanging 'round for a while, to the point where I was worrying that people would start 'talking' about how much time we were spending together and whether or not it was really appropriate in this day and age. He finally accepted a half pilchard, and sped off like a kid who's just been told Santa's drunk and totally kickass toys are just falling off his sleigh all over the place. I managed to turn him just before the reef, and after that it was all over bar the shouting, and there wasn't any shouting, because rock fishing is for gentlemen.

Urban Moocher

This winter moocher was teased out of one of the most accessible locations 'round these parts. It has wheelchair access and a travelator, and someone passes you a towel after you've handled a pilchard.