Sharks And Game

Fish

In the Trobriand Islands

VALUABLE information is sent by Mr.

E. Auerbach, Trobriand Islands, Eastern Papua. He refers to an article in “P.1.M." of June, reporting that Mr. G. F. Russell has gone to Fiji, with a view to establishing a shark catching industry, and wanted to know where in the Pacific sharks are plentiful. Says Mr. Auerbach: You may be interested to know that, on the Vakuta reef, from Vakula to Tewara (about 35 miles long) there is plenty trochus shell and bech-de-mer, but the boys cannot work it, on account of the sharks.

There are hundreds of sharks. 1 anchored there in about 2 fathoms, on the reef, and in less than half an hour there were at least 40 or 50 sharks around the boat. I have been about New Guinea and Torres Strait, but never have I seen sharks so plentiful as there.

There is a large area there for shark fishing.

I think that the sharks are numerous on Vakuto reef on account of fish be ing so plentiful—marlin, sail fish, all kinds of sharks, groper.

When I was a kid, I used to do a lot of line fishing off Barrenjoey, Sydney Heads, and Long Reef; but there is no comparison of those places, with this, as far as game fish are concerned. If the Trobriands were only known to the game fishermen in Australia! It is a fisherman’s paradise.

If you have a look at No. 4 Coral Sea Admiralty Chart, from Tewara Island to the reef (Vakuta Island, Trobriands), then from Vakuta to the end of Luscany

reef, including the lagoon in Trcbriands, you will see an area in which there are sharks galore, and big ones.

There are also plenty of alligators. 1 ought to know, because between the sharks and the alligators they have taken, in the last 12 months. 30 head of cattle and about 60 pigs. When the cattle go in swimming, the sharks snap off the bushy part of their tails.

If Mr. Russell is interested, it would be worth his while to have a look at the Trobriands.