Tooru visits Australia Page 1.
. . Tooru's Crayfish Art	Introduction: Tooru has been a silent participant on Crayfish World for some time. He is a very talented artist and taxidermist. The opening title of Crayfish World's 'Big Mumma' crayfish is Tooru's work. He is very modest in his skills and to date has left a low profile. This has been broken and I can now inform you that he is a master cray fisherman. Follows his Australian adventures with me Dave Downunder and see Tooru catch his first big crayfish.
Tooru from Japan arrived in Melbourne Australia very early in the morning. So while we were waiting for the campervan rental place to open we exchanged greetings. It wasn't easy. Tooru's English is okay but my Japanese is nothing. We also used the international language of crayfish. Yeah, he knew engaeus, astacus, euastacus and cherax. I even improved on my cambaroides japonicus.	. Tooru and my wife Sandra .
. The camper van he didn't really need .	Tooru drives Japanese style, it's scary .
I keep a stock of blue yabbies at our family farm which is a considerable distance from Melbourne. I brought back some eating yabbies and some blue yabbies so Tooru could see them. The setup below is at my home in Melbourne, it has a continuos flow, it can be used for breeding yabbies or for purging them for eating. (Purging is keeping the yabbies in clean water until their intestine track is cleared)
. Breeding/Purging stand set up .	Cherax destructor, normal and blue form. See an enlargement here
When Chris Lukhaup stayed with me a few years back I took him to this place, it's kind of strange. These yabbies here are terrestrial crayfish and usually spend their time deep underground. Under this bridge they are close to the surface and fairly easy to find. By the way, I didn't find any, Tooru found three.
. Under the bridge of the Darebin Creek	Engaeus affinis
Next off to the Insectarium to see my friend Bert. This is a world class collection of insects and is partronised by schools as well as the general public. Bert has static displays and also live displays. Our interest was his newest exhibit a swamp yabby. He also has a live large Murray crayfish on display who is really quite friendly. There is quite alot there for crayfish enthusiasts.
. On the way to Bert's, Tooru asked me what I thought about introduced trout and carp, I used some australian sign language for the answer!	'Rockin and rollin' .
. Bert, Tooru and Dave .	Swamp Yabby, Enlargement here .
. Euastacus kershawi .	What's so special about a swamp yabby you may ask, well according to science they sort of don't exist? There is confusion over this species, some say it is Cherax C. others Cherax rotundas. The jury is still out, more specimens have to be collected and research done. Dr. Susan Lawler from La Trobe University is working on this issue at the moment. More on swamp yabbies and Susan as this journey continues. The magnificent beast to the left is a giant Gippsland crayfish. You have to see it to believe it.
We were worried that Tooru wouldn't like our food, we discussed it a few times on the internet. As it turned out this trip was like a food lovers tour for both me and Tooru. So here we go, night one, entree of yabbies followed by kangaroo steak with scalloped potatoes.
. My son James puts the clean yabbies into the pot	Tooru wasn't so keen .
. They taste as good as they look	Tooru, James and Reggie the budgie eating yabbies .
Tooru likes kangaroo Photos by David Royal (Aust ) and Tooru Takenaka (Japan) Text by David Royal Continued here