Rescuers save 783 fish from certain death in Murray Darling

Interstate fisheries workers have joined the fight to save fish facing certain death by Christmas when the Darling River completely dries up.

• Not enough water to fight bushfires
• Cameras installed to help save rock fishers

Reinforcements have been called in to the rescue mission saving fish stranded in stagnant pools along the Darling River and doomed to die as the outback waterway dries up.

In the past two weeks 783 Murray cod and golden perch have been transported by NSW Department of Primary Industries from Menindee in northwestern NSW to the Darling River at Wentworth on the Victorian border.

Now, Victorian government fisheries agents will join the rescue mission to stave off a looming “fish Armageddon” expected by Christmas when the oxygen-starved pools along NSW rivers completely dry up.

Fisheries worker Ryan Shoesmith removing a stunned fish to be relocated from the drought-stricken Menindee and Lower Darling region.

Victoria is supplying a second electrofishing boat and it’s expected a further 500 adult
cod and perch will be rescued this week.

The fish are electronically stunned, scooped out of the water then driven three hours in temperature-controlled tanks and released by hand.

Not a single fish has died in the process.

The fish being saved are all mature, fecund specimens which are hoped will repopulate the Darling when the drought breaks.

Martin Asmus collects a fish to be transported to safer waters before the river dries up.

Ryan Shoesmith scoops up fish to be relocated. The stocks will be returned once the drought breaks.

Golden Perch can lay 250,000 eggs a year and Murray cod can produce 5000 fingerlings annually, so the fish have “immense recovery potential”, NSW Department of Primary Industries (DPI) Fisheries expert Cameron Lay said.

“We’re focusing on older, larger, long-lived species because they’re the breeding engine room of the river,” Mr Lay said.

The operation has successfully relocated about 800 fish in the two week fish rescue operation.

The fish can’t swim back north while the Darling River remains a series of pools but are expected to return to where they were caught once the drought breaks.

At Bingara in northern NSW, the Gwydir Shire Council has given four employees who are members of an angling club leave with full pay to catch fish on rod and reel and take them to a hatchery where they will be bred.

Fish rescues are also planned for the Macquarie and Namoi rivers.

Originally published as Rescuers save 783 fish from certain death in Murray Darling