panther thanks for u r kind words and ur informative post on canals and amounts of fish in them. still would like to see these canal developements reafforestated with mangroves tho. as to the 'minority of trawlers and netters ' plun dering any area they can get into....................... mate the areas in which we are allowed to work in are legislated by the gov and patrolled by fisheries to ensure compliance. with particular regard to moreton bay trawlers we have vms [ vessel monitering systems] which pinpoint our location to fisheries [dpi vessel monitoring branch] and define what effort has been made by induvidual boats to ensure that they work only their alloted nites.
as to pro joining in discussions i think the problem is that not a lot of us are on the net or even own a computer.....i know that in my industry assoc. out of 50 members about 7 have an email address so please dont attribute lack of involvement to indifference or ignorance .