The Gulf St Vincent Prawn Fishery was first harvested commercially in 1968. Exploitation increased rapidly and reached >600 t during 1975/76. Both catch and effort declined steadily thereafter until the fishery was closed in 1991 due to the poor state of the biomass. Fishing resumed in 1993 and catches again increased until 1999/2000 when catches reached 400 t. However, catches and biomass declined again over the next four years caused by a combination of factors including increasing exploitation rates that exceeded the increases in biomass after the closure and the targeting of high catches of large fecund females, particularly early in the spawning season. In December 2004, a program which required fishery-independent surveys to be conducted prior to the commencement of each of the four main fishing periods was established at 110 sites throughout the fishing grounds. Survey sites were trawled for 30 minutes during each survey. Data on catch rate (index of biomass), size structure and recruitment were collected. This information was used to determine conservative, spatially explicit harvest strategies. In the three years since this program was conceived, survey catch rates have increased by approximately 70% and total annual catch has increased from 160 t to 240 t.