THERE continues to be sightings of unusual fish in Wagonga Inlet at Narooma with two hammerhead sharks caught and released this week.
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Narooma locals Paul and Lorraine Clark made the hammerhead catches while out celebrating their 20th wedding anniversary with a fishing trip on Forsters Bay on Wednesday evening.
They estimated the two sharks to be about 90cm long and the second shark was a bit bigger.
“There must have been a school of them as we caught the two one after each other pretty much in the same spot out in front Taylors,” he said.
The sharks took live poddy mullet that Paul had out hoping to catch flathead, and they did end up getting a nice flathead to take home for dinner.
Both the sharks were released and just as well as hammerheads since 2012 have actually been protected and have to be released when caught.
There are also restrictions on what sharks can be caught in the habitat protection zones inside the Batemans Marine Park where Paul and Lorraine made their catches.
Unusual catches inside Wagonga Inlet are nothing new with a whole range of species being caught inside the estuary, including northern bluefin tuna, cobia and most recently amberjack.
There have also been cold water species such as South Australian snook and even King George whiting.
There was a fishing report in 2012 of a five foot hammerhead shark caught in the Narooma estuary, while there were also reports of bull sharks in Forsters Bay in 2011.
But go back even further when the tuna cannery was operating on Forsters Bay and there are even more unusual reports, including great white and tiger sharks.
Coincidentally, Paul used to work in the cannery as a teenager but by then it was only a packaging and handling facility for the tuna to be taken to other canneries such as Eden.
Paul, 62, remembers some interesting fish in the estuary back then too when there were sharks attracted to the run-off from the cannery at the base of what is now Gem Crescent.
