OVER the weekend, 18-year-old NT fisho Kai Hale hooked a tagged 105cm tagged barra worth $10,000 at Darwin’s Manton Dam. Due to the “Double the Dough initiative” running every weekend in March, Kai pocketed $20,000 instead of $10,000. The competition also doubled the donation, donating $2,000 to Million Dollar Fish charity of Kai’s choice, which was Cancer Council NT.
At the time, after grabbing a photo of the fish, Kai was close to returning it to the water, before something caught his eye -a tag covered in algae. Kai was over the moon to realise it was a Season 8 tag and hoped to put his winnings towards purchasing a new car and entering more fishing competitions in future.
“I just couldn’t believe it. I was happy enough it was a metery, let alone had a red tag in it. We would have had, I don’t know, 200 casts at that same fish before it ate, over about 45 minutes. We just followed it for ages,” said Hale.
This is the 18th tagged fish caught so far, making Season 8 the biggest and most successful season to-date, with the largest amount of cash ever won since 2015.
Season 8 will run till 31 March 2023, with nine barra carrying a tag worth a million dollars and 82 barra worth $10,000 fish us (or $20,000 if caught on any weekend in March, thanks to the Double the Dough initiative) waiting to be caught.
