Great post Ray. You should print it, staple it to the wall and read it again in 5 years time.Originally Posted by RayDeR
Quote:
Originally Posted by RayDeR
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Seabug's premise is the fishery is declining. In my experience, I see no proof of this where I fish.
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Ray De R
Fishing sustainability has changed over the years, bag limits, species size restrictions, tag and release on game fish, tournament fishing, has changed the face of the angler over the years as population increases and more people are putting pressure on the fishing stocks, we are getting better at managing those resources.
We no longer catch as many fish as we can, to outdo each other in within company to accomplish the best fisherman title, we no longer catch and kill sharks because we think we are doing a favour to humans. We no longer block creeks and rivers with nets to see how many fish we can hunt.
We have got smarter over the years, more people ar fishing than ever before and we now understand that we need to mange the valuable resources taht we have at our feet. I truly believe now days fisherman are more responsible than our ancestors, have ever been, I remember as a kid being on a larger charter boat with walkways covered in fish from the bow to the aft and thinking how clever we were.
Times have changed and we have become smarter and we still get a feed of fish, the bay is fine and so are the outside reefs of Moreton Island, I have been fishing them for years in a charter boat the same time very year for the past 12 years and I have never seen a decline in fish stock.
As far as cast nets? you have gotta be kidding, you throw them in relatively shallow water over sand and mud to catch bait fish or prawns and 70% of fisherman don't use them and the other 30% don't know how to cast them properly, hardly an environmental debate.
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Can you help please Jeremy, I still can't find it?
Chilli said
"There is a club that was formed in 1945 and those records do show an amazingly constant number and size of fish being caught by members to this day. I must point out that this particular club fishes mostly in the Nerang River which has NEVER been subject to commercial fishing."
An amazing stat Chilli. esp when you consider some of the huge catches made by club anglers in the late 40s & 50s. Len Thompson and some of the Southport blokes made regular 200+ catches in 12hr comps at The Pin & Broadwater in those days, and with split cane rods, before mono lines, and rowing heavy old wooden boats. I think Thompson record of about 250 bream in one night to win the Telegraph Shield has stood since the late 1940s. Anyway the 60s 70s & early 80s saw a lot of tons (100s) in club competition but in the 90s those had slowed considerably even with chem sharpened hooks, mono line, glass rods and faster boats. Since 2000 ???
I'd love to hear some of Pin Head's thoughts sometime on the old club days.
My club has fished Moreton, Pin & Broadwater every year from the early 70s and although some years are better than others the average number of fish per A grade angler per year is down almost 300%. In C grade the drop is in the range of 100%.
I don't think bait nets or cast nets have caused these declining catches as I know of some similar stats from clubs in NSW where these nets are illegal, and I'm not saying current stocks are unsustainable either. I'm suggesting that if you seriously believe stocks of bread & butter species like tailor, bream & whiting haven't declined over the last 20 or 30 years you must be living in fairy land.
Mike
Last edited by Mike Delisser; 18-03-2008 at 12:34 AM.
G'day Ozbizweb!
I can do better than that. 5 years? I have seen it over 30 years.
As stated I fish the Broadwater at Southport. I fished it regualrly in the 1970s. Like other fishermen we took home everything that bit on a hook that wasn't poisonous.
If it was too small, we often chopped it for bait or burley.
I have been fishing the Broadwater again for the past ten years. I see much evidence that the fishery is not declining. In fact, I would think the flathead fishery is the best it has been for many years.
The Broadwater is a heavily fished compact area and also has an excess of water craft and seabirds. Dolphins are common in the area too.
Ray De R
Last edited by RayDeR; 17-03-2008 at 10:12 PM.
G'day Ray, I cannot argue with you - I have not fished the broadwater.
I believe that offshore fishing is definitely not what it was. It continues to diminish every year. I have no doubt that no one is going to jump on me for saying that even though the flush-out has brightened things up a bit recently.
I believe the fishery eco-system is under increasing pressure from our rising prosperity - land development, growing population and effluent/agricultural/domestic runoff.
My point is only that you could easily adapt to fishing without a baitnet and there are more pros than cons to do so.
We cannot blame others for controlling the agenda if we fail to seize the opportunity ourselves.
This is an interesting thread. I am glad to see that there are numbers of fellow fishing folk that share my concern over fish stocks.
Before reading this thread I was going to post my own thread asking whether those who had fished the East coast over the past 20-30 years had noticed a significant decline in their recreational catch.
I have fished locations around the world including Europe, Asia, North America, Central and South America. Prior to arriving to Australia (around 7 years ago) I was really excited at the prospect of the fishing opportunities here. I have to say I was dissapointed. I was initially based out of Sydeny where I fished 2-3 times a week for 4 years prior to moving up to the Sunshines Coast. Now I fish out of Noosa and have to say that the reefs do not 'appear' to be very productive grounds. I am relativerly new to fishing offshore up here and I am sure that many reading this have their own secret boulders and patches of gravel that regularly produce good catches, but the larger well known reefs really are disappointing? Maybe it's always been like this and it has little to do with human involvement and more to do with currents, nutrients ect along our coastline ? I know that when I first moved to Sydney, the kingfish stocks were low due to the commercial trapping and that we notticed a signficant increase in their numbers the years following the banning of traps.
With regards to netting, I agree with Ozbizweb in that we could easliy get by without the baitnet, it just requires a little more time and effort.
Before anyone picks me up on my comparison between fishing Europe and Australia, yes...fishing in Europe is s**t and it is common knowledge that it is over fishing (commercial) that is to blame.
Under the thread title "should amateur netting be banned?" I have heard about no more shell fish, weed beds that no longer exist, offshore reefs that don't produce, a drop in catch rates, nsw has it so qld should.
Can anybody tell me or show proof that cast nets have an affect on any of the above.
Do you also believe that by banning nets, fishermen will use less bait. I myself have a much higher wastage level when using bought bait as against livies.
Jim
M62,
I hear what you're saying about the clubbies. This has not been the case in some clubs. Len scored big numbers in those days when there were limited numbers of fishoes vying for the Telegraph Shield, I can remember just a few years ago the numbers of boats in that comp were horrific where you could walk from boat to boat and do the length of the " Pin". I believe if you were to count the numbers of fish caught, divide it by the number of anglers catching those fish, then you will find a figure that will tell you, the same numbers and sizes of fish are being caught today as was in the 40's etc etc. It is all relative.
A lot of clubs are now facing the fact that they will have to digress from their normal hunts and go forth to forage for differing species to make a ' bag ' to score points of win a " trophy "....
Also, it wasn't fishing in a night... comp started at 3pm and lines up at 6am. That's 15 hours fishing........ clubs are reducing their ' time ' on the water and therefore catch rates are down. Divide the 15 hours up and say you bagged on 100 whiting or Bream , that's 6.6 per hour or 1 every 10 minutes. That still stands today. And when you're fishing, one fish every 10 minutes is boring...
Boring fishing... not the encompassing passtime of fishing. Two different things.
chilli
read the thread "Re; For Moreton Bay users" I think there is a link to it on p6 or 7.
"The underlying spirit of angling is that the skill of the angler is pitted against the instinct and strength of the fish and the latter is entitled to an even chance for it's life."
(Quotation from the rules of the Tuna Club Avalon, Santa Catalina, U.S.A.)
Apathy is the enemy
Hmmm
a couple of reality check points.
This recreational netting issue is a live issue, it is also being used as a red herring and bargining chip by the pro netters. so we need to be vocal about it.
When using a net of any form a recreational fisheran is still bound by size & bag limits..... ALL undersized regulated fish must be returned unharmed.......
In NSW...... " we can still catch enough live bait it just takes us longer"
So where is the reduction in impact.........it just takes longer.
Those of us who have been involved in the fin fish review will be aware of some issues about controll of recreational nets AND there are proposed size and bag limits specficlay targeted at bait spicies frequently caught in nets.
Most of us that do use nets, do not use them intensivly.
We will tyiclay chuck the cast net out a few times to get a few livies then go onto other things.
or
blokes who drag a net will only do so once in a while..... remember you need two blokes to do it and it must not be fixed to anything.
then there are scoop nets...... you recon you can do some damage to fish stocks with something with a 2 meter handle.
Yeh this is a live issue.
But the solution and the problem is not in the aparatus its self but in the way it is permitted to be used.
There are sensible things that can restrict the " unhelpfull " practices.
Like
ensuring that a person using a net must clear that net immediately and before casting it or another net.
And that a person can only have one net in use at a time.
So preventing chain netting with many cast nets and one operator.
cheers
I checked it out but can't see it there. It is mentioned enough here on Ausfish so I hope it true.
Last edited by Mike Delisser; 18-03-2008 at 11:18 PM.
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