I NEED A HIRO

Land-based sensei HIROAKI NAKAMURA shares his hard-won knowledge on catching the mighty barramundi without a boat

I HAVE a bit of pent-up frustration.

Of course I know what the continuous heavy rains bring — a very good season for land-based barramundi fishing after the rainy season.

But I wish for the rain would stop for about three days.

I went fishing at East Point during a lull in the rain on February 11.

Contrary to expectations, the seawater wasn’t muddy in colour.

I waded through the shallow water to the rocks.

I realised there were many box jellyfish in the water.

This was my first time seeing so many box jellyfish. Moreover, they were big in size. Wherever I cast my lures, I caught stinging tentacles on my lure every time. Fishing was quite out of the question. I was forced to stop fishing until the box jellyfish moved to other areas.

I waited and waited, but there was no sign of their going.

After I cleaned my lures without touching with bare hands I went home.

To date, the species is known to have killed at least 63 people in Australia since 1884.

Are we in the middle of a large outbreak of box jellyfish now?

It was raining heavily that night again.