Cast netting

[bay trawler]

pickers......yep....
do you know what the harvest of banana prawns is on the east coast [ not including torres straits or the gulf] 250 tonnes.
the professional fishing sector harvests 100 tonne.
the recreational sector harvests 150 tonne.
no accumulative effect of cast netting?
DPI&F figures would suggest otherwise.

[rando]

quote=bay trawler;609625]all moreton bay and beam trawlers adhere to strict legislative requirements as to the inclusion of Bycatch reduction devices [brd] and turtle excluding devices [teds]. Morton bay fishers were pioneers in the field of teds with these devices being in common use a good ten years before they were a legislated requirements.

1.The real reason teds were introduced was: turtles did too much damage to gear and catch, and sharks and other large creatures were a danger to the crew.


Moreton bays professional fishers [crab,prawn and line] have worked very hard to develope and implement an Environmental Management System [EMS] which was the recipient of the DPI&F sustainable production and best overall contribution to sustainable production awards in 2006. We aim for sustainable harvest achieved through recognizing and limiting our impacts.

2. But we wont recognise beam trawling has an adverse effect on the food chain in estuaries

re hoppers; moreton bay fishers are working on a govt. funded project to determine the costs and practicalities with regard to hoppers. you cannot just lump an extensive and heavy apperatus on the back deck of a vessel without research done into vessel stability and safety.

3.Why dont you just check what those vessals already fitted with them are using.

as to the repeated calls for the banning of beam trawling .
a DPI&F study [DREDGE 1983] found that
" disturbance by beam trawlers was 'imperceptable' relative to the major environmental disturbance in the region caused by barrage construction, siltation and pollution"

4.Pease tell me the name of one barrage in the moreton bay catchment

5.You are basing your argument on a study done 24 years ago?!!!!

a sepate UQ study concluded that the ' recreational sector would recieve no benefit from the closure of the beam trawling in QLD'.

6.OH Really!! based on what information???? WHO did the study,? who commissioned it.???Id like to read it.!

WMB Oceanics conclude after an exhaustive hydrographic studies in the bay and surrounding tributaries "there is little evidence to conclude that beam trawling is having a significant impact on either stocks or habitats of species targetted in recreational fisheries'

7.Thats very interesting , a hydrographic survey found that,,, ,I wonder what instrument they used to measure that finding

so please folks next time you want to bag out the beamies feel free but at least have the grace to preface your comments by ' despite the overwhelming evidence showing that beam trawling has minimal impacts on stocks and habitat'.......
blah blah blah. its your personal opinion nothing more.

8.Yes and thousands of rec fishers all over the state who day in day out witness bycatch discarded in the estuaries and experience reduced access to fish after the activities of trawlers are blind and stupid and cant possably make a reasoned assessment of cause and effect.
Nor can they understand that increased turbidity caused by dragging nets around in the silt and mud degrades the water quality and releases captive nutrients that wash in and out of the estuary long after the trawler has passed.
IT'S ONLY THEIR PERSONAL OPINION AND THEY HAVE NO IDEA WHATS GOOD FOR THEM

i would urge all fishers on this site to visit the Moreton bay access allience web sit for links to see what it is fishermen are doing in the bay to ensure sustainable harvest.[/quote]

9.Yes mate you have all been so tolerant and understanding of our position in the past I cant wait to jump on board and help you, now that the SH** is about to hit.
cheers
rando

[rando]

Bay Trawler
How was that rec catch figure arrived at please.
cheers
rando

[Poodroo]

I mainly use a cast net during the prawning seasons and yes there is a lot of bi-catch that ends up in the nets but I am not overly concerned about it for a couple of reasons. First reason is that I rarely see anything gilled in the net and they are easily removed and returned unharmed albeit a little shaken by the whole ordeal. The second reason I am not overly concerned is if they weren't so prolific in the first place then I wouldn't be catching so many of them. Species I see most often in the nets include herring, poddy mullet, scats, butter bream, and juvenile bream just to name a few. Have also seen the occassional little mud crab get caught up which also get realeased unharmed but it is challenging to get them out of the net as they insist on holding onto it. Bottom line is I try to release bi-catch unharmed and handle them as little as possible to ensure less damage.

Regards,

Poodroo

[bay trawler]

rando......
it seems to me that your arguing the veracity of scientific investigations based apon the conclusions not aggreeing with your personal beliefs. im not going to try to argue the validity of scientific studies cos im not a scientest....are you?
an interesting comment on barrage construction...... i dont think this refers to building "barrages" but rather to quote the dictionary ' subject to massive attack' which i think more than adequately describes the developement of any waterway in s/e qld. hope u dont live on a canal estate mate cos if u do ur part of the problem.
what else did you have.... oh you bagged out the enviromental management system developed by the m/b pro fishing community....good onya.....this coming from someone spruiking the recco industry which has no EMS in place to deal with its impacts. Another uq study concluded that the catch and release system of fishing has a mortality rate that is 'analogous' to trawling bycatch mortality rates.
i looked up analogous in the dictionary and it means same as.....just cos u see it swim away doesnt mean it doesnt die.,
get off your high horse mate.
as to looking at hoppers on gulf trawlers 90-100 footers and putting the same on bays boats of 40 ft....... well im sure even u can see the problem here....

think ive covered all ur rant.

as to the figures re pro/recco banana harvest..........dpi&f where else

[bay trawler]

ooops missed one
.Yes and thousands of rec fishers all over the state who day in day out witness bycatch discarded in the estuaries and experience reduced access to fish after the activities of trawlers are blind and stupid and cant possably make a reasoned assessment of cause and effect.
Nor can they understand that increased turbidity caused by dragging nets around in the silt and mud degrades the water quality and releases captive nutrients that wash in and out of the estuary long after the trawler has passed.

its a old whinge innit? i went fishing, caught sfa, was angry cos id spent bulk money on boat equipment tackle just like the fishing show told me to and when i didnt catch a fish first go like that fish fiddler on the tele i looked around for a convenient scapegoat on which to blame my lack of fishing abiblity.....a trawler.
as to ur turbitity etc there is a study that was done in WA looking at grounds that have been worked for years by trawlers. the study showed that biodiversity in these areas had actually increased......

so good onya....

[bay trawler]

oooops one more i missed rando old cock..... the last bit.
now from your photo of the fish id assume ur a small g greenie as opposed to a large g greenie.[ i consider myself to be in the former]. dont we face a common enemy in the large g greenies who lump the pro and recco industries together under the same ' extractive' heading along with mining and dredging i might add.
im not trying to convince u of anything or asking for your and i assume u mean ur industries help to get us and by that i mean the pro fishing industry out of anything. The Pro industry is working constantly to reduce its impact and we have a recognised and awarded EMS to prove this............

whats the recco industry got to reduce the impact of its uncontrolled, under regulated and un quantified 'extraction' .............................................

[kingtin]

whats the recco industry got to reduce the impact of its uncontrolled, under regulated and un quantified 'extraction' .............................................

The same as you, "old cock"...................DPI&F Regulation.

I'm just about to clean yesterdays "uncontrolled" catch of 4 measly fish ( 6, being my total take in as many weeks) , but I will get to you later regarding the greater issues thay you have raised, "old cock"

kev

[bay trawler]

a term of affection with no pejoritive overtones........
old bean pehaps....lol

[kingtin]

OK, I'm back

First point:

Bay Trawler and Pickers..............I did some research a while back regarding BRD's and TED's which was mainly for the benefit of the members at this site and my own curiosity. I invested considerable time and effort because I considered myself, at that time, not endowed with enough education in an area that was of great concern to me..............to put it simply, I was not prepared to enter into debate on an issue that although of great concern to me, I was insufficiently educated in, to take a stance without making a fool of myself

I received considerable help from the DPI&F and was invited to visit their research facility. The help they gave me was considerable and unsolicited and was purely at their invitation. I was thoroughly convinced that they were doing everything possible, as were most pro fishers, to reduce by-catch and strive towards a sustainable fishery. That said, I remained unconvinced with regards to turbidity reduction and am also unconvinced that there is sufficient change in the industry to minimise the effects of estuarine trawling.

2nd Point:

Within all alliances, there are likely to be those who do not really trust those that they are allied to. Although they may state similar aims and motives, the truth of the matter (as history and wars have shown) is that one party within that alliance are likely to use another party to further their own agenda.

One may strive to use combined might to defeat another for other hidden motives which may or may not include short term gain, with disregard for long term harm. That's how it is with politics and alliances and will probably always be.

All alliances should be viewed with suspicion as they are merely a compromise IMHO......... a means to use strength merely to defeat opposition with little regard for any hidden agendas within the allied parties who may or may not have been "traditional enemies".

History has shown that many of those who utilise alliances to defeat a common enemy then turn on each other to achieve their primary goal which is often to blame and defeat those who they have recently been allied to.

I don't see why the MBAA should be any different. The allied parties may appear to have the same goal, but it is likely to be purely for the individual party's benefit that they strive and not for the benefit of those they are allied to..............Reccos want a sustainable fishery for their benefit, pros for theirs. There is little doubt, in my mind, once the initial goal is achieved, the allied parties will turn on each other and return to their warring ways due to the endemic mistrust that they have of each other, and who is to say that either one is right or wrong in their assumptions? Sad isn't it?

The point I'm trying to make is that history is something to be learned from but it is a teacher that deals in cold, hard facts. The recco looks at history and sees what has become of the fishery due to mismanagement and greed. History teaches that the pro lobby (of old) is not to be trusted so why should the "new age" fisherman be any different?

3rd Point:

And this is one which reinforces the above. You write,

"ts a old whinge innit? i went fishing, caught sfa, was angry cos id spent bulk money on boat equipment tackle just like the fishing show told me to and when i didnt catch a fish first go like that fish fiddler on the tele i looked around for a convenient scapegoat on which to blame my lack of fishing abiblity.....a trawler.
as to ur turbitity etc there is a study that was done in WA looking at grounds that have been worked for years by trawlers. the study showed that biodiversity in these areas had actually increased......"

See what I mean about mistrust? Rando has always shown himself to be someone who is concerned about our environment. He is questioning our use of cast nets, something aimed squarely at reccos and not pros, yet you deride his comments, the moment you think he is taking aim at you. This/Your attitude is at a local level but i can assure you the attitude pervades at higher levels and IMHO the chance of reconciliation is like trying to bottle a fart in a hurricane.

I see first hand the dead fish floating in the Pine as do many of the members here. We see clearly those skippers throwing fish to the gulls and egrets. We SEE it with our own eyes. It isn't something that we've read about in a research paper or have anecdotal evidence of.........IT'S HAPPENED, IT'S HAPPENING NOW, AND IT WILL CONTINUE TO HAPPEN and I don't for a minute think the MBAA will do a damn thing about it and neither will any body or pressure group that has a professional trawler operator withing it's ranks.

I finish with just a few small samples of the research I did. This is current and with attributes, unlike yours which is dated and unattributed. Please take time to read and also read in depth, those who these snippets are attributed to. If you then cannot see where some of the guilt lies and how little has been done to alleviate it, then our fishing environment is doomed.

Trawling is one of the most widely used commercial fishing methods in Australia. Demersal trawling makes contact with the sea floor and therefore it can have substantial impacts on seabed habitats and benthic (occurring at or near the bottom of a water body) ecosystems (Harris & Ward 1999). The extent of essentially indiscriminate impacts can be significant, including physical removal, disturbance of organisms and non-living components and increases in water turbidity.

Trawl nets may dislodge attached species such as sponges and modify the habitat and food chains. Possible effects of trawling also include changes in food webs, such as increased populations of scavengers such as seabirds, fish and crabs. A 1996 study by the CSIRO and the Queensland Department of Primary Industries showed that each pass of the trawl along the sea bed removes about 5% to 25% of the seabed life. However, there is a cumulative effect; seven trawls over the same area of seabed removed about half the seabed life, and 13 trawls removed 70% to 90%. JUST THINK OF THE SMALL AREA OF THE PINE AND THE FACT THAT THERE ARE 4 TRAWLERS WORKING IT !

Trawling directly affects colonial and sessile invertebrates such as sponges, tunicates, bryozoans, hydroids and corals through smothering by sediment, dislodging them, breakage or prevention of further growth. It also affects mobile epifauna that are either captured in the trawl or damaged, or their habitat or food source is removed.

There is a substantial amount of literature documenting the effects of trawling on the benthos. Watling and Norse (1998b) have likened heavy trawling to forest clear cutting. They identify the impacts, both immediate (physical damage and destruction of organisms and communities; reduction of habitat complexity and 3-D structure; sediment resuspension and burial by settling plumes; water quality; bycatch) and long-term (changes in community structure and composition; reduction in numbers of sensitive long-lived, slow-growing, fragile and “tall” (epifaunal) species; increases in numbers of opportunistic species). Watling and Norse (1998a) argued that the “use of mobile fishing gear is on a par with agriculture as humankind’s most important physical disturbance of the biosphere” (p. 1178). A comprehensive review of the environmental effects of trawling is given by Jones (1992). It includes a history of trawling, effects of scraping off the epibenthos and ploughing soft sediments; sediment resuspension; destruction of non-target benthos; dumping of bycatch and how this may modify feeding behaviours seabirds and fish predators, as well as theoretical considerations including the rate of recolonisation, recovery, and the types of communities that are most sensitive. Harris and Ward (1999) have recently reviewed the information on bycatch collected during Australia’s commercial fisheries activities, and provides breakdown of the bycatch in all the major fisheries.

Several studies have been undertaken to attempt to quantify the impact of trawling. However, as pointed out by Dayton et al. (1995), there are difficulties distinguishing effects from natural variability, because the long fishing history makes it difficult to find undisturbed control areas. A study on the effects on seafloor habitat and associated invertebrate taxa in the Gulf of Alaska, USA, found that boulders were displaced, and large epifaunal invertebrates removed or damaged just by a single trawl pass. These structural components of habitat were the dominant features on the seafloor. There was a significant decrease in density, and an increase in damage, to sponges and anthozoans in trawled versus reference transects. Changes in density, or damage to most motile invertebrates were not detected (Freese et al. 1999).

CSIRO undertook a major review of the fisheries on the North West Shelf during the 1960-1970’s (Sainsbury 1987). Comparisons of sponge catch rate in 1967-73 (Shu et al. 1973a, b) with that recorded by a CSIRO survey in 1979 showed that during the 16 year interval there was a significant reduction in sponge frequency. Along with the loss of these sponges and associated benthos there was a reduction in certain fish species (Sainsbury 1988). The bycatch in terms of diversity and biomass was significantly greater in “lightly” fished areas than in “heavily” fished areas (Russell et al., in Sainsbury and Poiner 1988). This suggests that habitats with three-dimensional structure tend to be more sensitive to fishing disturbance than communities with mobile sandy sediments and little three-dimensional structure (Collie et al. 1997; Hansson et al. 2000; Jennings et al. 2001). Loss of three-dimensional structure changes the habitat, leading to reductions in populations of animals dependent on it for a range of biotic reasons including shelter, food or spawning. Another study in Torres Strait also recorded a similar phenomenon (Poiner unpublished data quoted in Hutchings 1990) and anecdotal evidence suggests that large sponges were also abundant on the shelf areas around much of NSW, Victoria and South Australia prior to the advent of frequent trawling.

Demersal fishing activities provide food for scavengers in the form of dead or damaged animals left in the tracks of the trawl or dredge or discarded as bycatch. Responses by motile benthic invertebrate scavengers to trawling can vary, as studies on benthic scavengers to experimental trawling in the UK have shown. For example, the numbers of hermit and swimming crabs, as well as starfish decreased in some sites but the density of hermit crabs increased in others (Ramsay et al. 1998).

Dredging and bottom trawling affect water quality and turbidity. Pilskaln et al. (1998) suggest that the resuspension of sediment from trawling may have important implications for regional nutrient budgets (input of nitrogen and silica into the water column). While trawling had no detectable effect on sediment grain size, tracks made by trawl doors were readily visible on the sea floor 10 weeks later; in some cases they were still faintly visible after one year. Trawling had also increased roughness of surficial sediments, reduced surficial biogenic sediment structure and the abundance of flocculated organic matter (Schwinghamer et al. 1998). Studies of trawling and mussel dredging in Danish waters have shown that these activities increased particulate matter and ammonia levels and decreased levels of oxygen, which may affect phytoplankton primary production (Riemann and Hoffmann 1991).

In New South Wales there are plans by State Fisheries to investigate the effects of trawling (most of the NSW shelf and upper slope are heavily impacted by trawling), but the proposal, which proposes to investigate the infauna as well as the epibenthos, has yet to be funded.

[bay trawler]

kingtin
first off you say where doing as much as possible [ teds brds] but its still our fault.
secondly yes youve got a wealth of info there much of which ive read myself.........so if the dredge83 study talks about the effects of trawling which you have so amply illustrated as being ' imperceptable' relative to the enviromental disturbances caused by developement,pollution and siltation then why not lay the majority of the blame where it should be.......developement/loss of habitat/pollution.
to my mind its logical......
and as to 'deriding' or whatever rando well if i gave that impression it wasnt intended....
have you bothered to go to the mbaa site to see what it is that moreton bays pro fishing sector is doing to limit our impacts ?
to accuse the fishing industry of being ignorant of its impacts and doing nothing to accept the responsibilities of its impacts is unwarranted and unfair.
id also like to note that you completely ignored the analogous bycatch mortality between recco and pro.....
im not trying to point fingers or blame im just saying that both pro and reccos face the same common problem......
destruction of habitat, if studies show that closure of the beam trawl industry would result in no benefit to the recco industry then maybe beamies and reccos shoulkd be looking for the real culprit.
thanks for your time and very obvious effort king tin.

[pontiph02]

[dont we face a common enemy in the large g greenies who lump the pro and recco industries together under the same ' extractive' heading along with mining and dredging i might add.]

I'm a large G Green and I think it's fair enough to group pros and recreational fishers together in terms of environmental impact. There are so many people on this site talking about working together with pros precisely because we are all extractive. That's OK, it's just a question of finding a way to extract sustainably.

I can't understand why the Greens are not considered the fisho's party, as their founding notion is to protect the environment that we all enjoy. The alternative is to place your faith in the major parties which are all beholden to corporate donations and lobbying: the current state of our coastal ecosystems provides a testament to the disastrous mismanagement of previous major party governments.

[bay trawler]

mate why wont your large g green bodies epa and the likes take on
dredging
canal and river developements
pob
nucular warships using brisbane harbour/port
etc
etc
etc
the real causes/ dangers?
seems like the green movements got balls enough to take on an industry crippled by fuel prices and imported product and or the fisher in his tinny out for a day on the bay but when it comes to the big issues.....
well i dont see anything in the review of the marine park thatll stop airports ports canal developements shipping or the next time the ronald reagun needs a brothel stop for its sailors......
eh?

[bay trawler]

This suggests that habitats with three-dimensional structure tend to be more sensitive to fishing disturbance than communities with mobile sandy sediments and little three-dimensional structure (Collie et al. 1997; Hansson et al. 2000; Jennings et al. 2001

ok what kind of sea bed do we have in moreton bay , for reference google wmb oceanics hydrogaphic survey, =
mobile sandy sediments and little three-dimensional structure . uq studies of benthic life in the bay on these mobile and shifting banks states the motility of the benthos common to moreton bay lends itself to rapid recolonization with MINIMAL impacts.
Im afraid im gonna have to discount some of the overseas stuff tho i dont see where it specifically talks about being a prawn trawl. prawn trawls cannot work on the three dimensional structures talked about above.
ive trawled for over twenty years and the bottom line is u cant trawl on reef.....
sandy bottom yes
reef no.
anyway kingtin chz

[disorderly]

Its just my insignificant opinion,but I pray for the day that pro netters and trawlers are excluded from estuarys, bays and inshore locations.
I used to live on the beach at mission beach and at certain times could watch trawlers going back and forth along the seagrass beds just offshore for most of the night.
It didnt take a dpi study to tell me where all the thousands of dead fish washed up on the beach in the morning came from.I used to feel sick to the guts looking at this.
How glorious it was when this practice was finally stopped.

cheers scott