FROM SALT WATER A snapshot of Western Port fishing life with John Woolley

FROM SALT WATER

A snapshot of Western Port fishing life with John Woolley

John Woolley has been around water most of his life. Coming from a long line of fishermen, this 78-year-old salt-infused man understands what it is to be connected to the nautical way of life. From shooting mesh nets out at high water across the tops of the banks near the mangroves and ‘walking’ for flounder as a young boy, to becoming deeply passionate about preserving the history of Western Port for generations to come, this is a man who originates from salt water.

John explains: “My grandfather Ashton Woolley settled in Hastings in 1860 after sailing from Geelong to shoot game in the Western Port

Jim Woolley’s grandson Gordon Lake hauls in his mesh nets. region. He was so impressed with what he saw that he decided to stay and settled behind what is now the Hastings-Western Port Historical Society and married a storekeeper fisherman’s daughter named Cecilia Carstairs. That’s where the fishing connection started. He then took up the option of land at Crib Point and became a sheep grazier as well. He also built the Woolley homestead on what was the British Petroleum refinery site until recent years.”

John continues: “Fishing was a growing industry back then and was done under sail. Gillnets worked from the boats out on the bay. Enginepowered boats didn’t come in until after World War I, so you had to sail or row to get out on the water. The fishermen worked according to the tides and shot cotton mesh nets out from the boats two hours before low tide. They had to shoot them out over the stern of the boat and pull them back a couple of hours later against the tide – hopefully full of fish. The mast had to be put up and down at regular intervals to stop it blowing off while hauling the net back in.”

Ashton’s sons Jim Woolley and Bill Woolley, and then Jock Woolley and descendants, continued the fishing tradition in the region. John also had a stint fishing with his father Jock when he was 13 years old before working for a boat builder and crewing on various vessels. Bill Woolley’s ‘ice box’, where he stored his fish, still remains at Woolley’s Beach on the Crib Point-Stony Point foreshore.

Hastings offered no harbour for shipping in the late 1800s, so fishing Western Port was profitable. Large groups of eager fishermen could be seen loading their nets and water bottles made from earthenware into the boats, alongside fire tins made for cooking and boiling tea. Years later, John’s father Jock was known as the Flounder King.

John continues: “I left school at 13, and my dad said: ‘If you’re not going to go to school, you’ll have to learn fishing.’ So I went fishing with him, but that didn’t last long because of his tough approach. He used to ‘walk’ for flounder between Stony Point and Woolley’s Beach on the mudflats near the mangroves when others had stopped doing it, and I was one of the last people to walk for flounder in the same way. I’d go out with Father in the boat and shoot the nets at high tide and wait until low tide during the night to find the flounder trapped on the mudflats. I’d strap the flounder basket lids (called ‘mud patterns’) to my gumboots and have a rope tied around my waist where I would hang sugar bags. I went with a kerosene lamp across those mudflats in the dark, making my way along the net to pick up the flounder. Then I’d lift the nets up, jiggle the flounder out, pick them up and put them in the sugar bags before tying them securely to the rope joining the nets and following the net back to the boat. We’d have to wait for the tide to float the boat before hauling the nets in and retrieving the sugar bags full of flounder. Sometimes you could hear the flounder and mullet flapping in the dark. The foxes walked out on to the mudflats to get mullet too, and one night I saw one going for the fish and trying to grab them. Meeting a hungry fox on the mudflats in the dark . . . I’ll never forget it!”

The Mornington Peninsula is full of fabulous fishing-related stories born from generations of fishing families who have cast their lines in the hope of bringing home the catch of the day. To find out more about those in the Western Port area, go to www.hwphs.org.au

LIZ ROGERS

Jock Woolley ‘Flounder King’ and boat

John Woolley today