Honey, I Finished The Ecosystem

"At the bottom, we swim into a tragic scene."

What a useful phrase. I can see it having many, many uses.

Ahhhh yes.

The famous CIL lure.

During WW2 my dad's cousin was a cook in the Canadian Army.

He mentioned that whenever the boys wanted some fresh fish,they'd lob a grenade into a canal and voila.

We had to do it the hard way,with a six foot poplar pole and a loop of snare wire.

I gathered from a conversation with a marine biologist (now dead) that this is a standard method for collecting specimens in rivers and ponds. As you can see, it is not selective, so there is no question of specimens getting away through superior speed or skill.

I forgot to ask whether it led to a flavourful fish stew in the evening.

Yeah well, south of the medicine line it's called the "Dupont wobbler"....

In such lands as Indonesia, where crocodiles are strictly a protected species (death penalty involved)....the authorities must deploy to kill those who kill citizens.

These designated hunters hopefully rely on various battle rifles...30 cal (.303, 30-06, 7.62) and usually( the perps like deep pools) frags with 8 second fuses. The locals deploy nets down-stream....the croc can take up to 1 hour to float up.

The croc is either taken back to base or skinned by the locals on the spot....the government hunters carry the stamps/tatooes to make the hide legal.

In the tropics, care must be taken eating fish...many fish are toxic (lethal).....it's enough to make ya stick to SPAM.

My father, a Canadian soldier in WWII, also talked of grenade fishing in Europe. No doubt there was much fishy collateral damage then too, as Cousteau demonstrated. And for some reason, my Dad and his fellow troops didn't give a shit!

Reminds me of Jerry Clower telling about Marcel and Clarence fishing in a Louisiana Bayou.

Game Warden pulls up beside their boat and asks: "How is the fishing Marcel?"

Marcel says: "Good, but we haven't killed any big ones yet.

Game Warden says: What?

About that time Clarence throws in a stick of dynamite,
Huge explosion shakes both boats.

Up comes floating a 6 pound bass.

Game Warden screams: "Marcel What the Hell y'all doing,
You cant do that!

Marcel hands the game warden a lighted stick of dynamite and says:

"You gonna fish, or you gonna talk?"

I never knew that Libby Davis once had a bit part in a Cousteau documentary.

During the bushwar in Rhodesia one of my team wanted some fish for supper. He stuck the barrel of his FN in to the river and pulled the trigger. Unfortunately he had put it in too far and the barrel peeled open.
The armorer was mad as hell and returned the weapon with a shorter barrel. It was a very fine close in bush carbine but very inaccurate over 100 yards.

The boys had a nice fish fry with red wine . Vintage from France of course.

We used to use an old crank telephone with the lines trailing over both.sides of the boat.. The fish would bob up quivering and you could pick the good ones..

I always did get a kick out of the early Coustaeu documentaries, those were the days before political correctness a real fishing show..
Vanishing coral reefs eh?

I read a report a while ago about a "successful expedition" to machine gun Sea lion rookeries by DFO in the 1920's. In the 60-70's DFO was planning to mount a heavy machine gun in the Gulf Islands to kill Killer whales with. Up into sometimes into the 70's DFO skippers were under orders to ram killer whales and basking sharks.

Isn't that like the story of the Park Ranger and a Hermit?

A young park ranger wanted to befriend this old hermit who lived in the park somewhere, so one day they went fishing together. While the ranger was setting up his rod and tackle, the old hermit lit a dynamite stick and threw it in the water.

BOOM!

The ranger freaked out and said "you can't do that!!!" and "I have to arrest you now!" to which the old hermit lit up another stick and handed to the ranger and said "are we gonna fish or talk?"...

As a scuba diver, I am lost for words.

Didn't ol' Jacques drown in a bathtub accident?

I hope to never enter a restaurant and see the "Whoopie cushion" fish on the menueee. Could be that it has already been there and that many of us has ordered it without knowing.

Sacre Bleu...............

Counting how many they killed to know how many are alive...

sounds counter productive

Ridiculously good comment thread ✌