One Mullet Net & It's All Over

[Slider]

Teewah Beach has actually produced a few fish this year. Good whiting have been relatively plentiful, bream and tarwhine in numbers not seen for 10 to 15 years and there have even been a few chopper tailor making occasional appearances as well as a 4kg fish taken Saturday morning in front of Teewah. While the average tailor and bream size is much smaller than in the past, it is pleasing to see that they can still be caught at all here after a very lean 5 to 10 years. Teewah locals have started fishing again and there has been a lot more anglers on the beach because there are fish here again.


Well, there were that is until Sunday morning when a small haul of a tonne or 2 of mullet and some tailor taken in nets south of Teewah shut everything down again. The bream that were being caught from every gutter south of Teewah on Saturday were not caught at all on Sunday. The choppers that we could spin up from each rocky gutter on Saturday obviously went with the bream as did the tarwhine, dart and whiting. Only flathead were being caught south of Teewah on Sunday but the northern end of the beach from about 10kms north of Teewah was still producing some fish. This will, or has changed as the netters were last seen (yesterday afternoon) heading north to where they know they haven't as yet spooked all the fish.


The same thing happened in early June when the first run of mullet were netted at the mouth of the Noosa and in the Double Island Point lagoon. At that time, longtail and mac tuna, school mackerel, tailor and dart were feeding close to shore on shoals of bait with terns and gannets in attendance. Bream, tarwhine and whiting up to 50cm were being taken by recs all along the beach. The nets were shot and all surface action immediately ceased and never did start again. The bread and butters disappeared and the only thing left were the first of the migrating humpbacks and a few flathead. It took several weeks for fish to return and as soon as they did, a net is shot and the process repeats - again and again as it does every year.


So for those wondering why there is such a push by the rec sector for net free regions, this is just one of the very good reasons why they are necessary. It is not just here that the nets are spooking the fish and ruining recreational prospects, it is anywhere that nets are used and fish everywhere are being scared away from the feeding and spawning grounds that sustain their species. The repercussions extend to dolphins, sharks and all seabirds and are serious. Oh, and it should be mentioned that in every location around the world where net free areas have been established, the commercial fishery statistics improve. There is more fish supplied to local markets than there was previously and the commercial fishers make more money. NSW has the proof - 300 licenses bought by Gov, 30 net free areas declared and the commercial catch increased. Seems counterintuitive, but is actually quite logical that this should happen if one understands fish behaviour around commercial nets.

[Still_Dreamin]

Well said.

[Noelm]

not too sure about the logic with the commercial catch increase thing... you think this is good?

[chris69]

Theres a heap a netters on the southen end of bribie beach the other day people fishing not far from them catching fish go figure that one out , must be a teewah thing.

[rando]

I videoed a crew shooting a net on kirra in front of the surf club thursday night.
the first time Ive seen an actual shot .
Ive seen a truck load of fish in tubs on Staddie ,but never seen a net shot and retrieved.
They waited a long time to shoot, and I waited there to see the result all the time thinking. I cant see where the fish are. So i was quite interested to see the result.
Doughnut!!!
Also the net did not look right coming in, all tangled up to my eyes. But as ive said ive not seen it done before except on tv.
I think it was a small mesh net so they might have been after pillies.
I will post it if i can work out how ,,,i think it is probably 20 minutes of film.

[JEWIENEWIE]

I think what slider was saying by that comment Noelm was that by reducing the amount or banning netting in certain ares in turn has shown to increase fish numbers in others which again in turn has given fewer licence holders bigger catches. I think, although it is early saturday morning and i am feeling a little dusty
JN

[Slider]

More or less sums it up Jewie. The more and larger fish that result from net free areas produce more and stronger larvae that spillover and mature in netted areas. NFA adults also move across boundaries into netted areas in their normal foraging and breeding activities. At the same time, rec anglers fishing in the NFAs are catching more and bigger fish, tackle shops are selling more bait and tackle, boat bldrs are building more boats .....


Chris, I'd need to know more about the situation that day at Bribie before I can draw any conclusions. Nets spooking fish is certainly not a Teewah thing - it happens everywhere, but there are a few variables that can alter how fish of different species will react to nets in a given circumstance.
The size of the haul and species composition is one variable - a very small haul has lesser effect than a large haul.
Species that are in the net and emitting alarm signals will elicit stronger responses from the same species outside the net.
The age and experience of fish (exposure to nets) is also relevant - older fish and pelagics react faster and stronger than younger and more sedentary fish like smaller bream who are more likely to hide amongst structure than flee in the general direction of the migration that is being undertaken by a pelagic. If there is a lot of food present for the fish, they are hungry and the haul isn't large, then fish do assess risk and can choose to stay and feed (or spawn) rather than leave.
Fish will feed in the presence of predators, or a net which is a predator. One of the best tailor sessions I had when I was a kid was when we found a school of 8lb fish being herded to the shore by a school of very large yellow-tailed kingies. The tailor were balled up like bait, but they'd hit a pilchard as soon as it hit the water above them while the kingies were carving into their mates.
The other consideration is that the netting effect is cumulative. The first net shot for the season, depending on haul size, will have an influence, but lesser than the 2nd shot, also depending on size. By the end of July in most mullet hauling locations, there isn't much left other than flathead and fish smaller than the mesh size .... remembering that the mullet come out of the estuaries to spawn and have no knowledge of previous hauls along the open beaches and therefore provide the bulk of catches in July in particular (FQ catch data). The fish that have moved away from a netted area will seek safe havens where they can still survive, but which are likely to be less optimal than the locations where they have historically aggregated to feed and spawn and which originally caused the establishment of the commercial aggregation fishery arrangements that still exist in Qld today.

I have watched fish flee and hide from nets on Teewah Beach a heap of times. But I have also seen the same behaviour from fish in relation to nets at Rainbow, Sandy Cape, North Point, Noosa river and Lake Cootharaba. I also have 1st hand accounts of the same phenomenon of apparent spooking by nets by commercial, charter and experienced rec operators in northern & central NSW, Hervey Bay, Bribie & Moreton Is, Weipa, Yeppoon & Keppels, Gladstone, Cooktown, Margaret Rvr, Cairns, Ethiopia, Mediterranean, Fiji, .... are the ones that spring to mind. The fish behaviour can be described as a fast skitterish swim like when a fish is caught and released, but can involve entire schools of thousands of fish all swimming in one direction - away from the net. I've driven 20 kms along Teewah Beach - in the direction from which skitterish fish are coming from to find the net with fish on the beach which I knew had to be there because of the fish behaviour I was observing. On Sunday morning it was only about 4 or 5kms but I knew there was a net between me, 3kms north of 3rd cut, and the river mouth and sure enough there was, but with only a very small haul. It was another 2 small hauls of mullet and tailor as they fled north before everything shut down altogether, including small bream and further north than after the 1st haul alone.

[samson]

Mate it's not just nets recreational fleet are more responsible for spooking fish in many situations than netters especially offshore on pelagic fish i regually get good hauls of fish literally meters from the netters all mullet season at Kirra before during and after shots are taken.I'm talking a lot of fish to pigeon hole this group based on your own personal opinions are a bit one eyed to me if you think banning these guys based on your opinions through your limited lack of knowledge of fish your gonna have to include the vast recreational fleet that out fishes the commercial tonnage of all varieties bar mullet because they are way more responsible in my eyes but hey I only fish about 200 days a year at sea I don't think I'm qualified do judge anybody yet you must be more qualified than most I guess to warrant wrecking people's livelihoods.

[airlock]

TBH I'm confused that this is still an issue worth arguing over. Large quantities of anything taken from anywhere greatly upsets the local eco-system, rip the bait fish out of the water without providing any replacement and all the fish that feed on them are going else where or expiring. Take spawning fish and numbers will drop, do this repeatedly and unsustainably and numbers will quickly drop off, and off course its not just the common place mullet as bi-catch in nets is an unavoidable issue. finally fish use scent and electrical signals to communicate and sense whats happening around them, a large number of panicking fish will spook the majority of other fish around them and they won't be in a hurry to return.

My general opinion is that the tourism and rec fishing dollar is much more the the money gained of pro-netters, unfortunately the two are often mutually exclusive with the former being at least reasonably sustainable assuming everyone sticks to size and possession limits. and of course every one knows fresh/live local caught bait beats the hell outa that tweed crap thats been in the bottom of the freezer for weeks.

[samson]

The problem is that rec fishing is proving to not be sustainable,there is just too much latent effort if it was sustainable I wouldn't be typing on my computer right now, if it was most recs wouldn't be looking at commercials to point the finger at either yet mullet netting time and time again has proven to be sustainable.

[sunnycoastfisho]

I think taking the mullet purely for their roe is pretty poor what a waste.

[samson]

Have you ever been to markwells every part is utilized more so than any other fish caught by recs and commercials alike.

[Rainbowrunner]

Im keen for a rec fishing license which includes freshwater and saltwater where the proceeds are used to buy out the pros.
lived in Botany bay area before and after all of the pros were bought out and fished St Georges basin where the same has been done and they are now 2 of the best rec fishing areas in NSW by far, the fishing improved by a huge margin in my experience

Imagine Moreton bay with no professional nets, trawlers or crabbers, that id love to see

[chris69]

There banned mackerel netting in hervey bay a long time ago weres all the mackerel now?????????

[Slider]

Who[s livelihoods are wrecked Samson when our unsustainable fishing practises prove to be that? Could be yours.

Yes, all of the mullet is used - for trap bait, fishing bait, Coles and Woolies via Sydney, the roe to Asia where they are now farming mullet and it is not uncommon for mullet, or tailor, or dart that is left uniced for too long or is crushed in the net as tailor regularly is, to be turned into fertiliser. Invasive species should be going to fertiliser, not native species and if the catch can't be managed better so that these fish can be supplied to the non-fishing public like the commercial sector state, then the catch should be stopped.
Our 'locally' caught mullet, tailor, bream, goldens etc disappears on a Markwells truck to Tweed where it is processed and distributed .... back to Noosa apparently if we are to believe the commercial sector. These mullet and other species should be a source of fresh and inexpensive seafood that is supplied fresh to the local market and the lesser quality product as bait.


Chris, the 2004 state wide ban on netting of spotted and Spanish mackerel, other than bycatch of around 10 tonne of spotties and not sure on Spanish, has seen a very notable recovery in Spanish numbers in particular. The state wide catch data for spotties is stable ... that's both line and net and I'd take that as not being a failure and probably a success given spotty numbers were disappearing fast ... thus the measure.