Sawfish research and release

[Sounds of a motorboat can be heard and an image appears of a boat speeding through the water from the left to the right of the screen]

[Camera pans around to show a close rear view of two men in a boat]

[Image changes to show a side view of men in a boat on the water hauling in a net]

[Sounds of a motorboat can be heard and an image appears of Paddy standing in the front of a dinghy dragging a sawfish belly side up caught in a net up towards the boat]

Male 1: I’m ready when you are.

Paddy: I like to get them on their back.

Male 1: Yep.

Paddy: Good grip of the net.

[Image shows Paddy gripping the net and holding it together and then beginning to unhook the sawfish’s bill from the net while having a conversation with Male 1 off screen]

Male 1: Sweet. 

Paddy: I reckon going on their back, like personally I reckon it slows them down.

Male 1: Yep.

[Image shows a second boat appearing and filming Paddy releasing the sawfish]

Paddy: You don’t want to bend it too much or you’ll hurt them. 

[Image shows Paddy securely holding the fish in the net while it flicks in the water as he tries to release it while he continues his conversation with Male 1 off screen]

You just work your way back along.

[Image shows the male unhooking the sawfish from the net with a hook type implement.

Paddy: Sometimes it’s easier than others.

Male 1: Yeah, that one’s not too bad.

Paddy: Yeah this one’s pretty good. He’s not that big. It’s the real big fresh ones that are hard to get.

[Image continues to show Paddy trying to release the sawfish from the net while continuing his conversation with Male 1 off screen]

Sometimes they get a lot of net on them too.

Male 1: Yeah and they get a roll on and a wrap.

Paddy: They get caught up in the net as well sometimes and you’ve got to try and roll them out before you can do this. It’s pretty hard. It works for us.

[Image continues to show the male in the front of the boat working to release the sawfish from the net]

Male 1: Like yeah, it’s not even moving. I can’t believe, it’s just quiet as.

Paddy: They do seem to settle down once they’re on their back but you’ve got to be careful you don’t bend that bill too much or you will hurt them.

[Image continues to show Paddy holding the sawfish by the bill and releasing it from the net]

[Image shows Paddy letting the sawfish go in the water, and then turning to face the camera and talking and a second boat can be seen in the background on the right of the screen]

Paddy: Any hopefully he don’t swim back into it.

Male 1: Champion Paddy, that’s awesome.

Paddy: All right mate I’m going to…

[Image changes to show a close view of the men in the boat hauling in the net]

[Image changes to show two of the men pulling a sawfish in with the net]

[Camera zooms in on the men untangling the fishing net from around the saw fish]

Male: Pop him down there.

Male 2: He’s free of the net, he’s free of that.

[Image changes to show the saw fish being held by two men while a third man inserts a tag into the fin]

[Camera zooms in on the sawfish being held by the two men, and then the image changes to show the two men dropping the sawfish back over the side of the boat and the sawfish swimming off]

Male 1: Well done. Perfect.