There seems to be some consternation about this pic.. At the beginning of the day the trailer was full with salt ice. What can be seen is the last of the fish weighed laying on top of what was left. At the end of the weigh in and prizegiving the fish were offered to the public and "all" were taken. None went to the Aquarium.
As a Surfcasting club we never held a contest last year for several reasons. Sponsorship for one but mainly to look at what we were presenting to the public. Until this year there was no size limit on what could be weighed. This was unsatisfactory and I can only imagine the outcry if a photo of some of the small fish from the past were in the public eye. Pania is a club with a passion about the state of the fishery. I am disappointed that this particular issue has arisen as we have been very proactive in changing the fishing phsyci of catch all even if it gets dumped later. we have lowered our weigh in numbers and some fish are expected to be presented trunked.
Another point that hasn't been presented here is the amount of sackfuls of kahawai that are taken off the river mouth when the whitebait are running. Sit down there and just watch. A trailerful of them is nothing compared to what is pillaged from the surf there. Worse still those that are taking sackfulls are back there next day doing it again.