The Ngarrindjeri were widely known as "outstanding craftsmen" specialising in basketry, matting and nets with records indicating that nets of more than long were used to catch emus. It was claimed by colonists that the nets they made for fishing were superior to those used by Europeans. The nets, made by chewing the roots of bulrush ("Typha shuttleworthii") until only the fibre remained which was spun into threads by the women to be then woven into nets by the men, were "considered to be a sort of fortune to its owner."