Monday, Feb 03, 2014 at 19:18
Bazooka continues to rant with a one eyed outlook.
I have stood in meetings where small scale commercial fishermen, are not complaining that they are not capable of catching enough.
In general the commercial fishers I have met have no problem meeting their catch quota...that is unless they have been locked out of their prime fishing grounds by the green zones, or their licenced area has become a restricted zone.
They complain that the government regulation is crippling them, they don't want to give up their licences that some have had in the family for generations.
They complain about the optuse and questionable "maths" use to calculate fish populations and catch share.
Much of the measurement of the "biomas" is from catch rate data, but does not adequately address how size & bag limits, quotas and economic viability effect the catch rate.
back in the bad old days when they took most of what ended up in the vacuum cleaner net that caght everything in it wake...catch data was probably a fair measure of what is there.
But when the various regulations and the economic viability of a particular spicies or a particular size of fish determines what the fisherman actually, brings
home and registers as catch.
Catch rate data becomes almost useless.
During the recent QLD snapper scandal, we stood there as a "fisheries scientist" talked about all sorts of very questionable "maths" and computer models.....then admitted that there had been no attempt whatsoever to directly observe the fish populatrion.
No admission that the
population may have moved to another location, no acknoledgment that the land was in drought and that the inshore grounds simple did not have sufficient nutrician.
No acknoledgement that fish learn, and become harder to catch and wise to methods and situations.
And certainly no acknoledgment that catch rate had reduced because effort had been reduced by regulation.
We where presented with total closures and redicuous conclusions bassed on the winges of a couple of dumb ass chater operators that kept on going to the same silted up reefs, week after week...and wondering why their customers where not catching.
Meanwhile those who knew what they where doing still caught as
well as they ever did.
A couple of years later and after some rain, the big fish and the quantity have returned to the inshore grounds because there is something for them to eat.
On the matter of "bluefin tuna" and "
orange roughy" in particular...a large part of the fishing pressure and the blame for the depleating stocks can be laid at the feet of the very large exploitative overseas operators like the japanese long liners and the south african roughy baggers.
Much of the recent fishereis data is little more than the worth of
toilet paper.
the states produce reports because the federal legeslation requires it...mostly they have neither the will nor the resources to properly assess the fish stocsk and simply fill out a report going thru the motions and telling what those above want to hear.
Don't worry about how accurate the information just lodge a report any report that is believable.
As far as the federal required public CONsultation, this is usually the absolute minimum period and is more like a public relatuions exercise selling the polocy that is already decided than willing to accept any input from the public or the actual indusrty players.
NO doubt that there have been situations where over fishing has occured, but in general the australian fisherey has been pretty
well manage over the last 100 years, and is in far better shape than most overseas countries.
while there may indeed be a few endangered shark spicies in australian waters,
Sharks in general are not over exploited, endangered or in any way at risk.
In particular the spicies in question in the original post in the in
places that they are proposed to be kulled.
AND above all the proposed kull...accounting for the
places, the spicies and the size proposed to be kulled presents no risk whatsoever to the prosperity of those spicies or any other for that matter.
cheers
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