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Beach Notes: Worming – Some Good Things Take Time and Patience

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by Des Walsh and Suzie Cheel

wormingrb

The bloke in this picture is “worming”, i.e. out to catch beach worms for bait. You can see he has a bag on the end of a piece of string. In the bag, which he is swishing back and forth across the sand as the tide comes in, he will have put some some berley, very smelly fish – which is why the bag sometimes goes by the very elegant name of “stink bag”, the smellier the better to entice the worms. He will also have a piece of bait in his hand and a pair of worm pliers to take hold of the worm that sticks its head above the sand and fastens onto his bait. Some people use a nylon stocking rather than a bag.

If the fisherman is an old hand at this he has probably discarded the pliers and just uses his fingers to get a grip on the worm and then haul it out.

Not a pasttime for the impatient: Des read where one keen fisherman declared he had taken two years to develop the necessary skills. But ask anyone who fishes off the beach and they’ll tell you the beach worm is the best bait of all.

Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh

Beach Notes: Stuck

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stuck

This huge log washed up on the rocks in a big storm a couple of years ago on the southern end of the beach at Rainbow Bay. It has been fascinating to see it weather and change color and texture over that time. Obviously there have not been big enough seas since then to wash it back out to sea.

It would be wonderful know it’s story from when it got dislodged somewhere up the river. We think it has probably come down the nearby Tweed River, into the bay, out into the sea before the force of the sea rolled it onto the rocks.

Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh

Beach Notes: Playing With Unpredictability

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At the Swell sculpture festival at nearby Currumbin Beach we saw, and loved, this work, titled Fiddle Sticks, by Col Henry.

fiddlesticks

We think the name might not translate universally. The “sticks” relate to a game Suzie says is called Pick Up Sticks and Des recalls being Fiddlesticks. This is a game where you throw down a bunch of colored sticks and then use the black stick to lift other sticks off the pile successively. When in the process you make another stick move you lose. Points are scored on the basis of the colors of the sticks you have retrieved.

The term “fiddlesticks!” was sometimes used by our parents’ generation as a socially acceptable expression of disbelief in some other person’s utterance with which they disagreed strongly: nicer than “what unmitigated rubbish!” or some other, more vulgar expression that might spring to mind. That usage seems to go back to at least the 18th century – http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-fid1.htm

The artist of the sculpture, Col Henry, clearly has the game in mind. He says the sculpture “plays with the concept of unpredictability”.

Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh

Beach Notes: Sandgroper

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“It is not always an east task to create a piece of artwork to look enjoyably simple. But there’s enjoyment in task”- Verner Neilsen the artist of Sangdgroper

sandgroper

This sculpture is part of the annual Swell Sculpture Festival at Currumbin Beach. This is an ironic play on words: a sandgroper is aburrowing insect found in Western Australia and the term is used by other Australians as a nickname for people from Western Australia.

Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh

Beach Notes: Biting Off More Than You Can Chew

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Ambition + Skill = Success
by Suzie Cheel and Des Walsh

This ambitious bird ( a darter) we saw this week while walking at Rainbow Bay. It looked like it was about to bite off more than it could chew (swallow). The fish it scooped into it’s mouth initially we thought the bird had no possibility of swallowing. The photos show that both skill and persistence do pay off and give success and satisfaction.

How do you turn your ambition and skill into success?

Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh