Snapper stats to think about

[dayoo]

Fisheries has published total annual tonnage statistics for the years 2002 and 2005 on page 2 of the RRFF booklet published in September 2008. The average of these two years will be used to establish the % catch share between Commercial, Recreation and Charter.

The Commercial tonnage for 2002 was 80t which increased to 264t in 2005. The tonnage increase was mainly due to an investment warning issued to Commercial fishos in 2003 which saw more effort by Commercial fishos in targeting snapper rather than Coral Reef species to get the tonnage up to keep their licences.

The Recreation tonnage for 2002 was 281t which increased to 550t in 2005. Fisheries documentation states that the latent effort did not increase but there has been no plausible reason given for the increase by Fisheries.

In December 2002 new bag and size limits were introduced for recreation anglers. The bag limit for snapper was reduced from 30 to 5 and the min. size was increased from 30cm to 35cm.

So if the latent effort remained approx. the same HOW did Recreational anglers manage to catch double the tonnage when the bag limit was drastically reduced from 30 to 5 per person and size increased from 30 to 35cm?........PLEASE EXPLAIN

I will be seeking answers at the next RRFF workshop.

Cheers
Barry

[Mike Delisser]

From my own experiences I would suggest it may be due to the explosion in the numbers of anglers who are specifically (and successfully) targeting snapper with soft plastics in the Bris River, Scarb Reef, Wello Pt and the Bay Islands. Anyone who's worked in a decent tackle store for the last 6 or 7 years will tell you there are hundreds of anglers who only target snapper on plastics when a few years ago they were targeting bream. When we use to fish with bait we'd get 1 or 2 every now and then, now each trip is shorter and it's either 3-4 or a bag out. //
Pics from Brizy Riv this winter, the last pic is from 2 boats & 4 anglers

[tunaticer]

Barry, From my experience alone.
I have been fishing the same patch of reef for nigh on 25 yrs. For the first 20 of those years my targetted snapper were not too often coming aboard with the techniques and baits I and everyone else were using. Lucky to get a decent keeper a morning.

With new tachniques adopted and different baits I am a LOT more confident of fish coming home with me and generally until about 2 months ago would bring home on average 3 bigger than normal fish than what I was taking frior to the change.

With that said I believe I am definitely not alone with the new techniques and results that are scored these days.

I would like to think that the stocks of these snapper in this location have always been there as they were about two years ago and can not be sure that is the case.

The last two months has been a lot harder fishing returning results similar to before I adopted the new techniques, does this mean the fishery is becoming depleted? Does it mean that the fish have learned not to succumb to this new technique? Does it mean that they have taken off on thier normal migrational sojourns?

I can answer none of those questions but I can be sure the newer techniques are a LOT more productive for the snapper in the areas i happily fish.

Jack.

[dayoo]

Guys Fisheries have stated that the latent effort has not significantly increased and that the total tonnage taken from Moreton Bay is only a fraction of what is harvested from offshore. The majority of us offshore fishos still use bait and in my experience plastics do not outfish bait on the numerous offshore trips I do each year. If plastics outfish bait offshore I would have converted to plastics years ago.

IF plastics are accounting for doubling of the tonnage Maybe another option to reduce the tonnage would be to ban plastics.LOL

Thanks for your input.

Cheers
Barry

[Moonlighter]

Agree with you Barry.

Something is very dodgy about those projections, even with population increase causing total numbers of fishers to increase but the participation rate to decrease, its still way too big an increase in just 4 years to be credible. Why DPI&F didn't see that themselves when they first did the extrapolations and ask themeslves the question is a mystery. Maybe too close to the process to see the forest for the woods eh??

Also, many people have commented that fish are wising up to fishing methods and I tend to agree, and then we adapt by finding new methods such as SP's, then the fish wise up to them and around we go.

So the balance I reckon always evens itself out between fish getting more wary and anglers getting smarter and using new approaches.

Graet work you are all doing - thanks again to you, Duncan and Bill and people like Dave Thompson as well.

Grant

[Mike Delisser]

I don't agree Barry and Grant.
How many more guys were using GPS's than were using them in 2002?
How much have the average sounder improved since 2002?
I honestly thought the rec snapper catch would have increased by more than that when you consider 2005 was the best season ever according to my catch log (until 2007).
In 2004 & 2005 anyone could land as many 35 to 45 cm snapper as they wanted on plastics around Peel (and hundreds did) all while the bait fishermen watched on BTW .
Haven't you noticed that whenever anyone puts up a post on this site claiming the fishing in the bay isn't as good as it once was they get bombarded with replies from Ausfishers claiming they're landing more fish than they ever have?
As for only a fraction of the catch comming from inside the bay, well 75% is a fraction of 100%. Did they provide you with the actual numbers?
Cheers

[Chris Ryan]

the DPI&F gent at Inala tonight said it made up about 6% of the total fishery (that is inside Moreteon). I could have misheard him but I am sure that is what was mentioned.

Chris

[Mike Delisser]

Filled in a few catch surveys at the Pinky ramp and they always asked about the fish and numbers, kept / let go ect, never inside or outside the bay.

Some interesting reading here


http://www.dpi.qld.gov.au/documents/...2006-Part1.pdf

http://www.dpi.qld.gov.au/documents/...2006-Part2.pdf

Also a report from the Bay Journal that mentions comments by Ausfishers that attended the Inala meeting.
http://bayjournal.com.au/joomla/inde...1858&Itemid=44

Cheers

[dayoo]

M62

The overwhelming majority of recreation anglers at the meetings I've attended this week do not agree with the estimates put out by Fisheries.
The point is that we don't want drastic closures based on estimates (guesstimates) which look very rubbery (like your plastics) at best.

The bay fishing for snapper has improved over recent years due to a number of factors like dry summers = improved water salinity, less polution and plastics.

In deep water offshore (60 to 90 metres) none of the above have much effect.
If the current is running more than 1.5knots try getting a plastic down with 1.5oz jig head.

A plastic does not generally outfish a well presented dead bait or livie offshore where over 90% of the snapper tonnage is taken.

The question I will ask DPI is how come in 2005 with bag limit reduced from 30 to 5 and min. size increased from 30 to 35cm the overall recreation catch doubled from 2002 figures.

If you agree with the estimates by Fisheries you are agreeing to a 4 month seasonal closure to the RRFF.

Cheers
Barry

[Horse]

Filled in a few catch surveys at the Pinky ramp and they always asked about the fish and numbers, kept / let go ect, never inside or outside the bay.

Some interesting reading here


http://www.dpi.qld.gov.au/documents/...2006-Part1.pdf

http://www.dpi.qld.gov.au/documents/...2006-Part2.pdf

Also a report from the Bay Journal that mentions comments by Ausfishers that attended the Inala meeting.
http://bayjournal.com.au/joomla/inde...1858&Itemid=44

Cheers

The most important part of that paper on Sustainable Fishing was part 3 where the findings were identified as being biased towards pessamistic conclusions. It was just as viable to interpret results in a way that indecates almost double total allowed catch
http://www2.dpi.qld.gov.au/extra/pdf...Assessment.pdf