Thats an absolute ripper! Hope you rubbed it into him about the English rugby performace... :))))

you allowed to keep those?

Rankin's aren't protected like the potato cods etc.

thought so. cheers for clearing that up.

My understanding is that all cod species over 1meter must be released and trust ne there are plenty of Rankins over that size.
JMHO
bags

that ones big but wouldnt be over a meter would it?

Close but no cigar! If it was a metre it would have to be held up to his chin and the tail reach below the knee. Chad's my height and there's no way that fish was over a meter long. And yes I had a full printout of the Gascgoine recfish bag and size limits on board and regularly referred to it for fish identification and correct size limits. When in doubt any suspect fish were released. Nothing came onboard for longer than a few minutes (photo shoot) unless it was destined for the dinner table.

The biggest issue we had was with the correct identification of Red Emporer versus Crimson Perch. Once ikijimied they look remarkably similar, so be careful guys. Reading and re-reading the fish id books ensured we stayed well within the bag limits for each individual on each day.

All fish frozen and destined for transport back to Perth were carefully bagged and individually labelled with species, angler's full name and weight of fillets. I was the only one who went close to the 20kg limit and was still well within that number.
I would have to say that we returned well over 75% of all fish caught, of which probably 80% were well and truly legal size.