Hardy, many thanks for your message and I agree with most of what you have said ... but not all.

When I was secretary of the Pania club, the heaviest fish argument was raised at virtually every large competition. My argument then, as it is now, I cannot accept a one pound - fourteen ounce snapper is worth $2000.00 and a sixty pound ray was worth $50.00, heaviest non scale. I know which one of the two fish is the most meritorious and was by far the greater achievement in landing, but that is the way it worked and still holds firm
today.

I was great friends with a member caller Gerry Derricut, he may still be a member. We argued this point many time over glasses of ale. On the competition match day, a Napier High School boy caught a very small shoalie snapper and walked away with the top prize, plus the junior prize, his was the only snapper landed. My friend Gerry caught the fish of a lifetime that day, he landed an eight pound - twelve ounce Blue Moki, at that time it smashed the club record. he got a $50.00 consolation prize. I am confident you will agree which fish was the better.

In Europe 99% of competitions are run on the heaviest bag of fish. In many cases stewards measure and record the fish so they can be returned immediately to the water. This in a conservation effort - all fish are returned. In those far off days with Pania you would have been quite surprised at the number of undersized fish that were brought to the scales, I remember small trevally were frequently presented in the hope of snaring a prize.

Perhaps there is room to reduce the spot prizes and boost the prizes for fish of the larger, non-scale variety ... I don't know and as I now don't fish comps I have lost any interest.

You are so right about the rod being stuck between the legs, one false move at it can do a terrible mischief to the wedding tackle.

I have another video to put on YouTube later this week, I also wish to record an eagle ray from being landed, to being presented for the table. As my wife is Chinese she will be able to give some good tips on flavouring the less popular fish. However, I also have one special video project I wish to work on, and this will be truly interesting. I wish to hook a small ray, hand the rod over to my wife, then I will take over the filming. Now this could be a very fascinating venture: my wife weighs exactly 46 kilos, I believe anything over 5 kilos could very well pull her down the beach.

Thank you for your nice comments, Hardy, you would be surprised at the encouragement gained from posts such as yours.