Every serious fisher has an image in mind when you say ‘sportfishing’. When pro fishing guide Tim O’Reilly contemplates his interpretation, memories of sight casting at hungry fish in clear water dominate.
I still remember vividly a walk up a remote Cape York river 15 years ago. I’d just navigated a shallow set of rapids through dense streamside vegetation and the small side arm again widened to a cast length. I climbed an overhanging melaleuca trunk to survey the situation. Just above the rapids, bony bream could be seen picking the rocks clean, heads into the current, and just upstream were two saratoga, pectoral fins splayed, gently gliding in the late-afternoon sunlight.
As I was about to cast long and wide, a brownish-yellow smudge materialised on the outside of a branch in the water below me. It was a big barra tail, the fish nose-down and out of sight. It took three casts, closer and closer, to make the barra stick its nose up and inspect my golden popper. One almighty surface boof saw me yank the popper out of its bucket mouth, almost falling from the tree and blowing my chance at all the fish in the process.
Memories of missed opportunities stand out just as clearly as those that come up tight.
CATCH AS CATCH CAN
It goes without saying everyone is entitled to their own opinion of what constitutes true sportfishing. My definition would be: spotting a fish (literally any fish) which an angler both recognises and seeks, before making a presentation to it.
It’s a spor t which normally requires anticipation, agility and heightened handeye coordination. It could be a 500-pound Blue Marlin or it could be a 400-gram whiting. Each would be just as sporting as the next in this context. It’s the act of fooling something you can see or sense which is sporting. No boat, sounder, spot lock or piece of gadgetry can replace this simplest form of fishing… sighting the quarry.
Sportfishing in many forms requires the use of stealth – making a presentation at a fish which hasn’t seen or sensed you. Noticeable exceptions occur in the form of light-up fisharound the boat.
Any fisher will need to use stealth at some stage of a session, whether it’s boat positioning, a purposeful drift, wading a flat or creeping through bankside vegetation. Try and visualise some of the captures you’ve made when sight casting at fish. Don’t these memories stand out the strongest and burn the brightest?
HEROES
Pioneers of the modern sportfishing era grew up very differently to how a keen young fisho will grow up today. Back then an angler in a terry-towelling hat and a pair of stubby shorts sliding a kingfish in over the rocks was the stuff of urban legend. It was an underground movement of mostly men moving in obscure contrast to the rest of society. I’m not sure fishing would have been cool enough for social media back then.
These people were very cool in my book, mostly due to their love of sportfishing and the feelings they were able to convey through words and imagery. Even as a kid who grew up in the country, I loved the northern coastal scenes of Malcolm Douglas and the fishy tales of Vic McCristal.
YANKING OFF
With today’s fishing and adventure media so saturated and polished, is there space left for these off-the-beaten-track battler types? Most of them are never truly appreciated until they get later in life. And today, unless you’re beating your own drum in some way, recognition seems only in the eyes of a few.
Fans, favourites, subscribers, tags, links and webpages weren’t part of the ethos in the 1980s and ’90s. Getting pissed up a Territory river or on the deck of a game boat were held as the pinnacle of physical prowess. But it was during this time the great minds and scribes of fishing developed, paving the way to a new fishing world. Now it’s almost a bloody glamour sport! These days a keen young fisherman with a half-decent Instagram following might date hot chicks! Just think of it. That’s until finding out what dating a dedicated fisho is like. Or finding a range of gaudy long-sleeve fishing shirts from BCF in the cupboard.
In a nutshell, Aussie fishing is growing ever more Americanised.
FUTURE
Recreational fishing is having a little moment in the sun. We need to marvel at what a fantastic recreational pursuit fishing has become in the Australian psyche. Besides the millions upon millions spent each year on fishing specifically, bucketloads more incidental spending happens along the way. Changes to fisheries management and government policy slowly, in the background, keep up with this financial potential.
There are major headwinds coming up to confront the sport of fishing, first from ardent green groups and those who seem desperate to make nature something humans cease to interact with. Quick to get behind them is a big majority of the population, largely forgetting what it is to procure your own food. Modern man is forgetting all about the actual act of hunting and gathering. It’s very dangerous to sportfishing for people to overlook the point of fishing in the first place, and it’s the role of those who believe they are fishing for sport to do so with the utmost respect both for fish and their surroundings, and to help convey these messages onto the next wave of keen fishos.
WHY WE DO IT
One challenge fishermen face heading into the future is the trap of knowing more and feeling less. Recreational fishing is very much a treasure of feelings, perceptions, ponderings, anticipations and struggle. But with the modern age has come a desire to stand out in the bunch, to strive for success, and, in fishing terms, that equates to catching loads of fish.
Ask yourself if you’ve become so focussed on success in fishing? Would you still go out without a camera of some description? Do you compare how much enjoyment you feel you’ve had with what you see on Youtube? There are many pitfalls awaiting us that can ultimately detract from what we loved in the first place. Simply to be out among nature and catching a fish.
Fishing can be such a swift learning curve for people these days. The very same Youtube, Facebook and Instragram posts can actually teach the inexperienced to feel the experience simply by viewing someone else do it. Humans are remarkably intelligent animals and the ability to recall and re-enact something seen elsewhere is instrumental to much modern-day success.
In many ways modern technology is enhancing the success of fisherman the world over. Yet every gadget introduced is a step away from the true essence of sportfishing: simply matching conditions with the ability to sight fish and cast at them. Don’t get me wrong, just like everyone else, I do a lot of casting at imaginary fish!
IT’S UP TO US
A fisherman needs to see what’s coming, just as they need to see what has been. The study of fishing techniques at the foundation of our sport, and a vivid memory of past success or failure, are common traits of keen fishos. The keenest drive the story forward, propelling the hopes, dreams and aspirations of every young fisher, and pushing the frontiers of the sport.
I have very high hopes for recreational fishing in Australia. The sport has received mass adoption and a very good public image associated with health and mental wellbeing. It plays a vital role in connecting humans with the natural world and often makes fishermen the natural world’s best protector.
Our fisheries have the chance to be prosperous into the future and this places a great deal of responsibility on the current generation to get fisheries management right. To innovate. To be inclusive. And to conserve the amazing way of life we are able to lead. The changing face of fishing can meet the aspirations of us all.