Noosa Wide 27th-28th October

[Any_Weather]

Yes Lovey and BigE, I must agree, I haven’t caught quality and quantity like that possibly ever but the average size of the ones I normally catch has certainly increased. That would have to be seen as a positive for the species sustainability surely.

Cheers
Lee


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[BigE]

Yep
my last two trips I've smashed the snappa bag no problem and the 70+ slot limit has cost the boat multiple fish, at least they seem to release pretty well unlike trag.

Not sure what the blokes who are making all the noise are doing wrong cause the last two years has been like shooting in a barrel.

BigE

[Lovey80]

I think with a fish like Snapper and Pearlies that grows fast to maturity but then takes a long time to grow into the older models, Fisheries Queensland haven’t considered heavily enough the time the previous restrictions will take to show fruit in the fishery before they called some mathematicians to tell us further restrictions were needed.

I get the bay bay and the Gold Coast May be area overfished but outside of that I think things are improving.

[Dignity]

https://www.daf.qld.gov.au/business-...itoring-update

Snapper are a slow grower, about 4 years old before legal size, above article is some research into age vs size. I suspect other factors are involved. I recall many years ago listening to Paler more talking about targeting big snapper, the next speaker preferred the smaller snapper (I think the size limit then was 27cm) and he proceeded to tell us how to go about catching them, up to 300 a night. Times have changed and maybe the limit is on the low side but I can't see how it could be justified to reduce it further (Chinese whispers earlier this year suggested thst).

[Any_Weather]

Yeh I agree Sam, reducing the limit below 4 does seem extreme. As Lovey says, in the bay where they get hit soo hard may be different but out in the open ocean, there is a lot of water that doesn’t get hit with any regularity to keep the stocks sustainable surely

Lee


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[Any_Weather]

300 a night!!!!! My filleting hand is aching just thinking about that. That is insane


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[Lovey80]

I personally would have preferred that during the last snapper clown show, that they increased the MLS to 40 and kept the bag at 5. Fisheries are so concerned at the moment with things like Virgin Biomass and “growth over fishing”. I think having an increased MLS and the weather are a better management tool.

[FINICKY]

If they are concerned about stocks, maybe a closed week might be more suitable. Similar to coral reef fin fish up north. Two one week closures during peak breeding season.


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[Lovey80]

If they are concerned about stocks, maybe a closed week might be more suitable. Similar to coral reef fin fish up north. Two one week closures during peak breeding season.


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Dont quote me on this but I think the reason that closures on RRFF aren’t considered as effective as the ones on CRFF is because th RRFF don’t school up and spawn like the CRFF??

Going back to the winter before the last RRFF review Pearl Perch were in plague proportions in areas around Caloundra 12 mile to Caloundra wide and in patches up to Murphy’s at Mooloolaba. Problem was they were all in the 32-34cm bracket. It was so bad that for some weeks I would have to move because I was loosing so much bait to fish I was throwing back. Those fish aren’t around those areas since in those sorts of numbers. I suspect as they grew they moved to deeper waters, though there’s certainly some quality size pearlies around Caloundra wide at times and spots east and west of the banks. Fisheries are getting ready to throw further restrictions on Pearl Peach as we speak, mark my words. Of course it will be off the back of a computer model that uses a poor extrapolated data recreational survey from years ago as a baseline and assume the recreational sector has been taking 7% more fish each year on year since then because that’s the rate of boat sales since. It’s a complete joke.

I haven’t seen a similar phenomenon with plague proportions of smaller snapper over the last decade but fishing the same areas with the same fishing methods, I’m seeing a slow but steady improvement and I put that down to the previous 35cm MLS and 5 bag. I put that down to those smaller fish having one or two more years after becoming fertile to spawn and add to recruitment numbers. More numbers are making it through to fertile sizes and it is slowly snowballs into more numbers in the larger sizes.

This is one over 70cm fish is a joke. The depths I catch 70+cm fish in are 90% of the time in deeper water and those big fish aren’t going to survive with their guts hanging out their mouths by the time I boat them. The survival rate on returning big fish makes the measure completely redundant. If further measures are needed I think a 40cm MLS and a bag of 5 is plenty. Not that I think further measures are necessary.