del

man i dig that second track, its rad!

trichocereus pachanoi nice fat healthy pup cheers del

ah your a "sport fisherman" well that explains it! its a bit Hyprocritical you have no problem hooking a fish with a barbed hook dragging it out of the water where it cant breathe just for fun and a happy snap! I bet the fish loves it too! dont make me laugh!You environmental crusader you! Ive had this argument too manny times to care. I will just say that if I want to eat a fish I will make shure it is captured in the most environmentally responsible manner possible. Aside from picking fish up that has died from natural causes washed up on the shore! I dont want to argue with you. there are real moronic uneducated douchbags that partake in spearfishing and they really do give it a bad reputation. I cringe when I see morons at the beach with some cheap spearing gear they just bought from the fishing tackle store.And trust me I go give them an earfull! unless they are bigger than me in that case I call the fisheries department! I know species size limits and bag limits better than any line fisherman I know. And you really have to admit there are plenty of bogan fwits that love to go line fishing! And they too dont give a shit about bag limits and size limits nor do they have any problems with leaving all there rubish behind. Theres douchbags in every recreational activity and you have just got to deal with it, I do every time I get accosted by some fat bogan line fisherman at the beach who clearly hasnt caught anything and gets angry at me because I walk past and say hi with a couple of nice drummer for my dinner and maby a cray in winter if im lucky. Most of the time i am out in the ocean just marveling at the diversity and enjoying the tranquility of freediving but if I want to spear a fish or two for dinner I will. I take no joy in seeing the fish suffer and the struggle is over alot quicker than if one was catching the fish via hook and line. anyway you shouldnt just assume that i am some kind of environmental vandal, I understand the local marine ecosystem beter than most (because I spend alot of time in it instead of on the rocks getting snagged up haha). Just accept the fact that this form of recreational fishing (spear) can also be done by people who are responsible and know the rules like you obviously do in regards to line fishing. When it all boils down we are both chaps who enjoy fishing so I dont want to agrgue about it any more. Its such a shame that the various fishing fraternities cant work together better with each other. We really need to in order to protect the right to fish and ensure it is done by all sides in the most responsible manner possible. del P.S It was actually spearfishermen (the Australian Underwater Federation AUF) who lobbied to have the blue grouper protected in the first place back in the 60's. lets be friends

Hehe blowng be wary of those wobbies, they are pests! and they will have a go at you if you get too close. Every summer in Sydney some backpacker on a dive course finds this ou the hard way. man the huge ones give me the hebejeebies too. And stingrays just sneak right up behind you like some kind of sea creep! man they have startled me a few times too!(people wouldnt believe how big they can get!) Although they are harmless I still give them plenty of space, dont want to be the next person unlucky enough to die by stingray! as for comercial fishos, the few that I have known were tuna longliners on the east coast and they had no respect for any living creature period! Its all about money, they didnt hesitate in shooting seals and all manner of marine life that wasnt tuna. I never witnessed this but I dont doubt it. Human/shark interaction is a real worry, especially the baiting of great whites for cage diving, you cant just assume a shark will not understand anything or learn anything from those kind of encounters. Some knid of highly evolved intelegent supershark may result. haha que movie! del

Yep shark shields what I meant. I guess they are not going to stop a shark who has made up its mind. But I would consider one for peace of mind. I have spoken to people who swear they work and others who say they dont. I think there is footage of both testing outcomes posted on youtube. Druged out liar dont get all conservative on me,I know better then most the vital role these top level predators play in the ocean. Spearfishing for what you ask? Fish mate! Im just out there catching some fish for dinner, why should I support the commercial fishing industries? I like to eat fresh fish and I like to free dive so why not combine the two! Theres nothing wrong with that! (unless you are a vegan, than you have every rite to detest it) I don’t wish to argue about this here. What do you do with your speard fish? Its common practise to tow them along at the end of a float line that’s about 20m long. So dead fish are about 20m behind you. I guess my comment “wonder what makes them snap” was a bit brash and seemingly uninformed. But im just going by my experiences of seeing them so peacefully and gracefully glide past in the water, its so hard to imagine these things in feeding mode when you see them like this mind you these are not huge great whites or anything of the sort. Anyway I have derailed the topic and thus shall shut up del

What a horrific loss for his family. I cant fathom something like this happening to loved ones. I do a lot of freediving and spearfishing and quite often see sharks, not massive whites and tigers mind you but mostly whalers, the biggest been about 7ft most around 3ft. I think about how terrifying it would be to have one of these become aggressive. I cant imagine the horror of been approached by large great white. I really wonder what makes a shark snap and decide to attack, all the times I have seen them they have just been cruising by and hang around for a few seconds before disappearing. Each of these occasions I have been in the water with dead fish and urine in my wet suite. I am not drawing any similarities nor comparing my experiences to this horrific attack but shark behaviour is just so terrifyingly unpredictable. Some of my dive buddies use shark pods and if I have the spare $$$ one day I will get one. Do any of you surfers use them? del

Much more interesting and informative than all the election garbage on telly. thanks for such great pics!

Ha ha as stupid as that is coupled with the fact that no styling product ever touches the hair on my head, for some reason deep down inside me there is an urge to buy it! I got problems man....

Hi I have one of those, sold to me as a crested cereus sp. Im no expert so you may wish to wait for better opinions but that isnt a trich at all. The seller is wrong. They are very common and very cheap (got mine for $4). Look at the spines and wool from the areoles, no way is that a trichocereus sp. Still a cool cactus, but not a valuable crested trich as the seller sugests . cheers del p.s if you want a cut of one give me a p.m

hi sorry, yeh i got a bit carried away and poetic with that claim, While greenpeace and seashepards efforts may be privately funded, all the beaurocracy, paper pushing, delegates, debates etc are not. The Australian Government is very anti whaleing and goes to great lengths in opposing Japans "scientific" exploits in any way they can politically. Im not saying they dont have good intentions (I think its sweet ) but I really think the money and efforts could be better used in trying to manage sustainable fisheries and habitat protection. Protecting the oceans by saving the top level consumers is just stupid. You need to start at the bottom (habitat protection etc) There is no point saving whales when we are killing everything else. sorry I will shut up. thanks for hearing me out. cheers del

Hi I very recently finished a degree in fisheries and aquaculture mannagement. five odd years ago when I started it seemed like a great idea. But The whole comercial fishing world is utterly depressing! It really angers me that whaling gets so much publicity, when the state of our oceans dire! I have this arguement with manny 'environmentalists'. But I stand by my belief that whaling is the least of our concerns! Countries like Japan and China have such an enormous demand for the worlds seafood. They want it, they are willing to pay high prices for it and they dont care how it is caught or how endangered the target species is. The really important species (sharks, tuna, and other top level preditors) are depleted to levels so low it is a joke that we still fish for them. Advancements in fishing technology is the only reason you can still go and buy most of these products. Whales are cute and we dont eat them so lets waste lots of government $$$ trying to stop that when it would be much better spent on fisheries mannagement. Your average shcmuck has no idea how much we have depleted the ocean (to the point of serious concequences). The people doing it dont care, aslong as get there fish and the human race wont do anything about it untill its to late, just like every other broadscale environmental problem. sorry bit of a depressing rant, but feels good geting it off my chest. my 2c del

yep thats the one. Sugar Man is the song you are thinking of. He made a couple of albums but Cold Fact is my fav! Its just such a weird mix of musical styles, yet it works so well.

yep luera can get pretty gross, especially on long weekends! But lucky for you the north shore types from sydney dont stray more than 20m from the main stip of shops. They only visit look outs you can enjoy from the back seat of their big shiny 4wd. So if you avoid Leura shops you wont even know they are there. I went into that well known bakery in Leura and it was $5.70 for a pie! My folks have a farm in the megalong valley, its really dam nice up there. (I even saw that black panther, honnestly did). Im goning up there for the winter salstice, best night of the year. Great idear to get out of sydney HM wish I had the guts to do the same! peace del

What about rodriguez has anybody mentioned him? his album "cold fact" has some folkey elements and is probably one of my favourite albums! kind haunting and depressing but still up beat. my 2c del

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