Greedy illegal fishos impacting SA marine life: Jess Adamson

While most recreational fishos are doing the right thing, those caught illegally and greedily depleting our precious marine resources cannot be tolerated, Jess Adamson writes.

Seized tinny, fishing equipment and 124 squid. Picture: Supplied

If you cast your mind back to Good Friday, you might recall it was a pearler of a day.

It was a great afternoon for fishing and like many others, we threw our lines in off the Fleurieu coast, happily heading home with a few whiting, flathead and a single squid.

As we came into Wirrina Cove Marina, we spotted some uniformed fisheries officers, armed with binoculars and cameras.

They were crouched down, focusing their attention on boat not far from shore.

A few days later a press release with the headline “Are you Squidding Me?” caught my attention.

It read: “On Good Friday, following a tip-off over potential illegal fishing activity in the area, fisheries officers at Wirrina Cove intercepted two fishers at the boat ramp, seizing 124 southern calamari – well in excess of the 15-per-person limit. Two cuttlefish were also part of the catch.”

Seized snapper from Cape Jervis. Picture: Supplied

124? No wonder we only got one.

What an absolute disgrace these people are. There is no reason to have that number of calamari on board except pure greed.

The two men from St Clair will face court in coming months, charged over the seizure of a commercial quantity of calamari. It will be alleged the pair were planning to cash in by selling them on. Instead, their catch was confiscated and their boat and fishing equipment seized.

Sadly, it wasn’t an isolated incident. Just three days before, again at Wirrina Cove, two men from Hindmarsh Valley and Queensland motored in with 101 calamari on board.

All four face a maximum penalty of $20,000 for exceeding the personal daily bag limit. If convicted, they’ll also face the additional penalty of five times the commercial value of the squid.

Throw the book at them. These people have a blatant disregard for our precious resources and shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near our marine life.

The penalties aren’t tough enough in my opinion and many of our “good” fishos agree.

Calamari catch off the Fleurieu. Picture: Supplied

“Name and shame them,” one says, on fishinSA’s Facebook page.

And from others: “The tinny wouldn’t have been worth much. They should have taken the tow vehicle as well.”

“Maximum fine and maximum everything, not just a slap on the wrist.”

“Good on fisheries for catching these clowns. Hard enough now to catch a feed of squid, let alone this sort of thing going on.”

“Crush the car and the tinny and leave them in the boat ramp carpark for a while too.”

In January this year, three men fishing off Cape Jervis also found themselves in strife.

During a routine inspection, they told fisheries officers they hadn’t caught a thing, but a quick search uncovered 22 snapper.

Twenty were identified as under the legal minimum size of 38cm, caught in waters where the take and possession of snapper is currently prohibited.

It’s hard to understand why someone would deliberately target a species under protection.

As if there’s not enough going on in our oceans and waterways right now.

The images of sharks, stingrays, seahorses, fairy penguins and cuttlefish washing up on our shores across the state are heartbreaking.

The algal bloom is causing havoc in our waters and while the impact of that won’t be known for some time, experts are concerned the deaths will be catastrophic for our marine ecosystem. The government has declared the bloom “the most serious natural marine challenge we’ve had”.

We’re being asked to become citizen scientists by helping authorities measure the devastation, and all the while there are fishermen illegally and gleefully filling their boats, many of them getting away with it.

The good news is that most of SA’s fishing population continue to do the right thing.

Primary Industries figures show that on average, 627 fishers are cautioned each year, 411 receive expiations and 12 are put before the courts.

Given 300,000 of us count ourselves as recreational fishers, those numbers are pretty good.

But there are real concerns about declining calamari stocks.

It’s possible bag limits will be reduced in some parts of the state if things get worse.

PIRSA’s acting director of fisheries operations Matt Read says bag limits are set solely on sustainability.

“Every one of those limits is done so based on ensuring that each of those species has an opportunity to reproduce and give back to the biomass at least once before they’re taken,” he says.

“Where people go outside of those bag limits it potentially puts that biomass into jeopardy.

“They selfishly and deliberately go out for their own personal needs, they don’t take the resource into consideration, they don’t take anyone’s else access to the resource into consideration. It’s just pure greed.”

On the flipside, officers are seeing an increase in goodwill from members of the public, reporting those breaking the rules.

“They want to see people who are deliberately doing the wrong thing, caught and penalised because of their bad behaviours,” he says.

“They’re keen to see individuals who flout the law like this be put in front of a magistrate and receive the harshest penalties that the magistrate is able to hand down.”

I don’t claim to be a fishing expert. I’ve caught a few bits and pieces over the years, including my engagement ring which my now husband attached to a swivel, cast it into the ocean off Hamilton Island and waited for me to reel it in. Risky business.

But it doesn’t take an expert to know we’re heading into dangerous territory with our marine life.

Whether you believe the science or not, it’s clear a small minority of people are putting our fish stocks at risk.

Now more than ever, I hope the courts use every available lever to send a clear message it shouldn’t and won’t be tolerated.

Originally published as Greedy illegal fishos impacting SA marine life: Jess Adamson