Wild
Fisheries with a Future
The Lakes and Coorong Commercial Fishery is an
inland and inshore waters community fishery, in the upper southeast
region of South Australia.
>> see
map
Estuarine, saltwater and freshwater species are
harvested by the license holders stretches in the area from the Wellington
ferry on the River Murray, the waters of Lakes Alexandrina and Albert,
the waters of the Coorong lagoons and estuary, and the beach and coastal
waters from the Murray Mouth to Kingston SE.
It has been commercially fished since 1846, with
a number of generational fishing families (some going back 5 generations),
still conducting their activities in the area. This gives fishers
an intimate knowledge of the environment and an understanding of the
history that has shaped the development of the fishery.
This in addition to the owner-operator policy and
the commitment to low impact fishing methods means the fishery has
an ecosystem based focus and strong community links. The pro-active
approach to their business has fishers participating in numerous activities
and initiatives.
It has become a highly modified system, following
the construction of barrage network from 1935 to 1940, when 89% of
estuary turned into fresh water. The impacts of man’s interference
in the natural regime include reverse/summer flooding, riparian zone
modification, introduced species, massive water usage and flow modification
and pollution. Yet despite this 90% of value comes from 10% of the
original estuary with the landed wharf value of the fishery approx.
$5.4m (Econsearch Report 2003/04).
Ethical,
Sustainable Harvest
The diversity of available harvest represents one
of the keys to the long-term sustainability of the fishery. Since
fishers can shift effort to different targets should priority species
be scarce, they are not forced to deplete stocks just to make a living.
The main species fished are mulloway, flounder, yellow-eye mullet,
cockles, black bream, bony bream, redfin perch, callop, and European
carp. The gear types used are slightly modified versions of traditional
aboriginal gear types.
Fishing methods utilise low mechanisation coupled
with highly energy efficient netting and manual harvest types. This
results in low by-catch, highly specific methods operated by well-trained
operators with decades of experience with the ecosystem and it’s
fish.
The modification of the ecosystem means there is
a diverse range of habitats (freshwater, estuarine, marine and hyper
saline areas.) The advantages of being a multi-species, multi-gear
fishery is that there can be a rotational harvest system, which shifts
effort from one species to another when one becomes financially non-viable
to target, or spreads effort across several species when conditions
are ideal.
Management of the Fishery
The commercial fishery is managed using a complex
mix of input and output controls aimed at matching harvesting capacity
with resource availability and controlling growth in collective harvesting
capacity.
Existing controls include limitations on the number
of licences, a wide range of gear restrictions, area and time closures.
There are also a limit on the number of commercial agents permitted
to assist fishing operations and size limits for individual species.
The majority of the management controls used today
have been in place for many years. These are all outlined in the recently
released Management Plan 2005
Management Structure for the Lakes
and Coorong Commercial Fishery
Current Scientific Projects
- Biology and ecology of Mulloway in South-eastern
South Australia (SARDI, PIRSA, LCF, University of Adelaide)
- Biology and ecology of Goolwa Cockles (Donax
deltoides) from the Coorong, South Australia (SARDI, PIRSA, LCF,
University of Adelaide)
- Gear interaction of non-targeted species in
the Lakes and Coorong commercial and recreational fisheries of South
Australia (SARDI, PIRSA, LCF, SEANET)
Back to Top
