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Marcus Barber: How do you catch the crayfish? Do you use a lot of people?
Philip Yam: No, 4 people 2 people. A couple of people is plenty.
Viv Sinnamon: Sometimes you have people on the side, but mostly it‟s just holding the net
down and pulling them in the net. It‟s one of those little fine mesh nets.
Philip Yam: At T-Bone waterhole if you want to get a feed you don‟t need a net. You just go
in there and grab them by hand.
Viv Sinnamon: The old people used to drag bushes and stuff, or catch them by hand.
Although there was a preference for bush food, particularly aquatic species, cows were and
are still a part of the diet for Oriners people. Cows often came in close to the homestead
during the wet season, but it was still beneficial to have multiple people to transport the meat:
[In the wet] you can see water, water all through them trees. You could not go anywhere in
February and March. Couldn‟t go nowhere. Norman and I used to go out for the killer when
there was no rain. [We‟d] pack bags on pack horse, put some meat in the pack bags. We
could not go far. Too boggy.
Ezra Michael
In more recent times the rain and boggy ground made locating cattle for food easy, but the
absence of horses made transporting meat more difficult, meaning it was better to use larger
numbers of people:
Marcus Barber: Was that fun staying at Oriners in the wet with 5 people? Or too many
people in a small space?
Philip Yam: No it was good fun. We got plenty of fellers to have fun.
Louie Native: And especially you‟ve got plenty of hands, to kill meat.
Philip Yam: Because sometimes you want meat you‟ve got to walk to get it
Louie Native: You can‟t drive…
Philip Yam: Carry it with bag.
Louie Native: Carry it back home to the homestead.
Philip Yam: You don‟t have to go too far to get killers. They come right to the homestead.
Louie Native: Because it‟s high ridge there.
Bush food is clearly a significant aspect of life at Oriners, and one of the attractions of going
there. However it has never been the primary motivation for travelling to and living in the area
during remembered history. Work of various kinds has usually been the priority; pastoral
work, land management work, and the work associated with establishing and maintaining
appropriate infrastructure. Paddy Yam commented that during mustering times in the
pastoral era, time for hunting for food was limited. However based on the comments above it
is clear that there were significant „down time‟ periods at other times of the pastoral year,
notably during the main wet season. Although constrained by the boggy ground, these
periods did provide people with time to access food from the surrounding landscape. More
recently, the different pace and rhythm of land management work, as well as greater
numbers of people staying at Oriners for non-work related reasons, had increased
opportunities for hunting and fishing before the recent decline in residence. Therefore
hunting for bush food is likely to be a significant feature of life for people should a largely
permanent presence in the area be re-established in the future.
Working Knowledge at Oriners Station, Cape York
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