ASFB Home > Recreational Fisheries Sub-Committee Newsletter No 1 Dec 1995

Recreational Fisheries Sub-Committee Newsletter No 1 Dec 1995

Regional Updates

Editor: David McGlennon: SARDI, PO Box 120, Henley Beach SA 5022
Ph: (08) 200 2448, Fax: (08) 200 2481
E-mail: mcglennon.david@pi.sa.gov.au

The ASFB Recreational Fisheries Sub-Committee was formed at the conclusion of the Workshop titled "What's the Catch" held in Canberra in 1994. It was felt that a need existed for a forum in which Society members engaged in research and management of recreational fisheries could maintain contact and exchange information on their current and future work.

Quantitative recreational fisheries research has become increasingly important over the last 5 years. Funding is now available from the Fisheries Research and Development Corporation for recreational fisheries projects and State and Territory Agencies also seem increasingly willing to allocate funds. The diversity of projects listed in this newsletter bears testimony to this. In this context, it is important that researchers have current knowledge on survey methods that have been used - both successfully and otherwise.

The field of recreational fisheries research involves many subjects not immediately familiar to the fisheries biologists who generally conduct the work. It is important, therefore, that discussion and information exchange extend to other disciplines such as economics and the social sciences.

Initial expressions of interest for the Sub-committee were taken from Workshop participants and a mailing list established. In the first year, members exchanged views on the purpose and direction of the Sub-Committee. These are reflected in the draft Terms of Reference listed below. The primary function of the group is to facilitate information exchange.

Draft Terms of Reference

  1. Provide a forum for discussion and co-ordination of Australian recreational fisheries programmes.
  2. Advise the Society on current and emerging issues and strategic directions in recreational fisheries research.
  3. Promote the use of quantitative and innovative scientific methods for the estimation of recreational fishing parameters.
  4. When requested, provide expert advice on matters relating to recreational fisheries research.

Contact with the broader ASFB membership will be maintained through regular newsletters inserted in the ASFB bi-annual Newsletter. This is the first of these and contributions are welcome from anyone who wishes to circulate information. It is hoped that each issue will include updates from around Australia which will enable readers to maintain an awareness of both current research and results, and of planned research.

Regional Updates

Northern Territory

FISHCOUNT 95

In 1991, the Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries commissioned a specialist consultant (Kewagama Research) to conduct a review of existing and potential data sources and collection methods for the recreational fishery in the Northern Territory. In its report, the consultant identified a 'general population' survey methodology with the potential to cost-effectively collect the base line information required. Using a combination of traditional household research techniques and diarised data collection methods, the methodology presented substantial potential benefits for its application in the Territory.

As a result the Department undertook to further develop and test the methodology during 1992/1993. After extensive development work and three field testings, there exists a high degree of confidence that the research instrument designed is the most cost effective available and will provide a range of valid data of importance to the Department and others with an interest in recreational fisheries. The survey instrument is also considered to have widespread potential for use by fisheries organisations elsewhere in Australia and overseas.

The survey has been designed to provide;

  • a broad range of recreational fishing information to establish a framework of understanding of recreational fishing in the Northern Territory,
  • catch and effort statistics for a wide selection of species which will provide benchmarks from which to examine any changes in stock levels,
  • information on the social and economic benefits of recreational fishing to enable informed resource allocation decisions and,
  • information on public perception and awareness of various fisheries issues.

The survey instrument is also structured so that the information can be classified by variables such as season, residents, visitors, types of fishing and geographic regions. In addition it can identify potentially threatened resources which may require specific research programs. The benefits of these research programs is that they can be devised on the basis of needs, as identified by the main study, and used as an extremely cost effective monitoring of important or sensitive fisheries issues.

The survey is conducted in three parts;

  1. The initial survey - identifies household members and visitors and collects basic demographic information, together with data in recent and future recreational fishing activities and participation. This forms the basis for respondent selection for the subsequent parts of the survey.
  2. The longitudinal survey - applies to all intending anglers (over 5 years). Respondents are provided with a 'survey kit' which includes a 'memory jogger' diary and asked to record details of fishing activity or related expenditure over the longitudinal period. At pre-arranged times the interviewer calls to collect the data for the elapsed period.
  3. The attitudinal survey - is conducted after the final diary contact of the longitudinal period, among longitudinal respondents aged 16 or more. The survey, Fishcount '95, commenced in November 1994, following the appointment of a survey manager and a team of 10 interviewers. Five of the interviewers are based in Darwin, the remainder in Katherine, Nhulunbuy and Alice Springs. To date (Jan '95) 4 waves of initial interviews have been conducted with a response rate of around 90%.

Anne Coleman
Recreational Fishing Assessment Officer
Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries
(089) 811 475

Western Australia

The Recreational Fishing Research Section at the Watermans Marine Research Laboratories, began their research programmes in 1993. The major research project is a two-year Australian salmon and herring anglers creel survey along the southwest portion of Western Australia. This program, funded by FRDC aims to quantify the recreational catch and effort in the Australian salmon and herring fisheries to resolve questions of resource allocation for these commercially and recreationally important species. Anglers are asked about the time spent fishing, the type of fishing gear used and their catch of all species. The results from the first year of the survey were presented at the 1995 ASFB conference. A second research priority is the development of a recreational catch and effort database. The database will contain catch and effort statistics from participating angling clubs around Western Australia and will provide an historic picture of the recreational fishery against which present data can be compared.

Research programmes have been completed recently on the short term mortality and injury rates of tailor and the catches of fishes by recreational netters fishing in estuaries of the southwest of WA. In response to the angling communities' concerns about potential declines in the metropolitan tailor stock, research was conducted between November 1994 and April 1995 to examine the mortality and injury rates of juvenile tailor hooked with different fishing gears. This project was facilitated by the cooperation of the Volunteer Fisheries Liaison Officers and staff at Watermans Laboratory who fished for the tailor. Tailor were caught, unhooked and held for one hour to assess short term mortality. All tailor alive at the end of the hour were tagged and released. After six months at liberty, 1.4% of the tagged fish have been recaptured. The recreational netting research programme incorporated fisheries research netting trials and interviews of attended versus unattended netting operations to examine the impact of unattended netting on catches of undersized versus legal sized fish, the proportion of damaged fish and the time required to reach bag limits.

Research continues into tailor biology, ecology and genetics along the WA coastline. In addition, there are initiatives being considered for further Australian salmon and herring research. These three species are among the top ten recreational species along the southern coastline of WA. In addition, the Recreational Fishing Research Laboratory is overseeing a collaborative programme between Research and the Kimberley Recreational Fishing Liaison Committee on Barramundi tagging in the Broome area, and two university postgraduates projects- one on the biology and ecology of several cod species in the Ningaloo Marine Park and the other on the biology and ecology of black bream in the metropolitan Perth region.

Suzy Ayvazian
WA Marine Research Laboratories
(09) 246 8442
ayvazian@uniwa.edu.au

Queensland

Queensland Fish Management Authority (QFMA)

The Queensland Fish Management Authority (QFMA) and the Queensland Department of Primary Industries (QDPI) are lead agencies for a joint project between fisheries agencies throughout Australia to develop a recreational fisheries database that can store all types of recreational fisheries data. This project has been funded by FRDC for three years.

The monitoring programme of recreational fishing throughout the State consists of several projects;

  1. All charter boat and fishing tour guide operations will be required to complete a compulsory logbook detailing, amongst other items, level of fishing activity, location, species kept and species released. It is anticipated that there will be about 350 fishing operations monitored with this programme.
  2. A telephone contact survey is being used to estimate regional fishing effort, fishing activity and collect some demographic information and secondly to seek volunteers to take part in an extensive recreational fishing diary programme.
  3. A recreational diary system has been designed to provide regional and state wide estimates of fishing effort, fishing activities, catch by keynote species, demographic and other social characteristics. To provide a reasonable level of precision it is anticipated that about 4 000 diaries will be issued. A follow-up system to obtain good response rates is being currently developed.
  4. Fisheries and other Inspectorial staff are actively working in many fishing locations. Modification of the reporting system currently being used by them will supply cross check data for much of the information collected by other methods, especially catch rate information by species and time spent fishing.
  5. Fishing competition records from 20 recreational fishing clubs are currently stored within various databases. More of these data sets are available for collection, punching into databases and interpreting.

Queensland Department of Primary Industries (QDPI)

John Russell & Rod Garrett, Northern Fisheries Centre, Cairns. (070) 529 888 An access point creel survey is currently being conducted in the Johnstone River (Innisfail - 100km south of Cairns). Over 50,000 hatchery reared barramundi fingerlings with microtags have been released into the Johnstone River since 1992/93 to supplement the natural barramundi population. Electrofishing has determined that up to 30% of all barramundi about to recruit to the legal fishery are of hatchery origin. An access point survey is currently being conducted to estimate catch rates and population structure of the fishery and in the future determine the proportion of captured barramundi originating from hatchery sources. Catch cards are also being issued to regular fishers and obtained at tackle stores.

Alf Hogan and Chris Barlow, Walkamin Research Centre. (070) 933 834 Informal surveys of recreational anglers by stocking group representatives occur in Tinaroo Dam which has been stocked with Barramundi. QDPI has had input into design and analyses.

Peter Jackson and Alex Hamlyn, Brisbane. (07) 2242185 Many water storage reservoirs in south east Queensland have been stocked with native Australian fish species of angling importance. Fingerlings are bought by the Qld Government recreational fishing enhancement program and from funds raised by voluntary stocking organisations. Monitoring of the recreational catch and effort in these reservoirs is undertaken by voluntary stocking group representatives under the guidance of DPI personnel. The monitoring is based on Doug Humes' methodology for Victorian reservoirs and funding is generally provided from consolidated revenue. The Brisbane Area Water Board supplies funding for QDPI to intensively monitor recreational catch and effort at 3 reservoirs close to Brisbane. This is done by way of boat based roving creel surveys and access point surveys.

Wayne Sumpton, Southern Fisheries Centre, Deception Bay. (07) 203 1444 A 5 access point creel survey is currently being conducted in Southern Queensland to estimate the species caught and CPUE of recreational boat fishers in this area. The survey is based on sampling 48 days / annum at each site over 12 months and is stratified to sample 24 weekdays and 24 weekend days at each site between 0830 hrs and 1730 hrs. Effort data is being obtained from aerial surveillance flights from Ballina to Noosa. Ancillary effort data is being obtained from observers at the access points and the Coastguard and Airsea Rescue observers. The project is FRDC funded.

Darren Cameron, Southern Fisheries Centre, Deception Bay. (07) 203 1444 A boat based roving creel survey of recreational fishers at 2 estuarine entrances in Southern Queensland has recently been completed. The survey aimed to estimate CPUE and effort for Dusky Flathead at 2 locations which are considered "hotspots" for the capture of the species. The survey was small scale with only 27 days sampled at each location. The survey was stratified unevenly by season and evenly by weekday and weekend day to ensure most sampling effort occurred during the Spring months when peak catches were thought to occur. Effort estimates were obtained by instantaneous counts of boats and fishers in the survey area throughout each survey day. Analyses have commenced and the project is funded by Qld Govt Consolidated Revenue.

Darren Cameron, Southern Fisheries Centre, Deception Bay. (07) 203 1444 & Lew Williams, QDPI (seconded to QFMA at present) (07) 225 1846 Recreational Small Mackerel Catches in Queensland. A random telephone survey of 6000 private pleasure boat registrants of a total of 110,000 in Qld was undertaken with the co-operation of the Queensland Government Statisticians' Office in May to August 1994. The survey was stratified by Geographical Statistical Divisions as determined by the Australian Bureau of Statistics and by numbers of boats registered within each Statistical Division. The survey aimed to estimate the total catch and effort of recreational fishers who catch small mackerel in Queensland.

Persons surveyed who captured small mackerel were also asked if they would complete a diary of their daily fishing activities for 18 months. 1,000 owners of private pleasure boats are currently completing these diaries until March 1996. The completion of these diaries is essential in providing validation of estimates of the total catch obtained in the original phone survey. Catch and effort information from these diarists is obtained every 4 months by telephone and mail by QDPI personnel and voluntary anglers supervised by QDPI personnel.

Estimates of catches of small mackerel of recreational fishers from interstate is also currently being investigated by way of caravan park surveys form Mackay to Cape Tribulation (1000 km of coastline). Demographic and catch and effort information is obtained from the owners of caravans, vehicles and boats which are registered in states other than Qld. These persons who are often recreational fishers escaping the winter months in southern Australia were not in the target group of Queensland registered private pleasure vessel owners questioned in the original survey. It is believed they may however account for a reasonable proportion of the recreational small mackerel catch. We are not aware of precedents for this sort of survey and would be more than willing to outline the logistical problems and constraints of such a recreational fishing survey.

Darren Cameron
Southern Fisheries Centre
Deception Bay, Qld.
Ph (07) 203 1444
camerod@planet.mh.dpi.qld.gov.au

South Australia

The South Australian marine scale fishery has been surveyed using the bus-route creel survey method since April 1994 to estimate fishing effort, harvest rates and total harvest. Gulf St Vincent and Investigator Strait were surveyed for 12 months from that date and results are currently being processed. The study area was spatially stratified into 4 areas and between 55 and 68 days were sampled in each area. Preliminary results suggest that the recreational harvest is significant, with the King George whiting harvest of similar magnitude to the commercial catch. The survey is now operating in Spencer Gulf and West Coast waters.

Prior to the survey's commencement, the bus-route survey method was evaluated for this fishery using computer simulations and pilot studies. The results demonstrated that the method is suitable for large scale surveys and can be conducted relatively cost-effectively. Manuscripts of the full evaluation are also nearing completion.

Records of four angling clubs have been analysed for trends in catch rates since 1964. Data have been collated for sweep (Scorpis spp.), Australian salmon and yellow-eye mullet. The project was conducted by Tony Slade for his thesis at the AMC and the results will be published soon.

David McGlennon
SA Research and Development Institute (SARDI)
Ph (08) 200 2448
mcglennon.david@pi.sa.gov.au

Victoria

Recreational and commercial catch monitoring is conducted by the the Bays and Inlets Fisheries Assessment Program at the Victorian Fisheries Research Institute. The program is funded by the Victorian Government, Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. Recreational fishing surveys have been conducted in Victoria since 1982/83 in Port Phillip Bay and Gippsland Lakes and since 1983/84 in Corner Inlet. The results of these surveys have been published in the Victorian Government's internal Marine Fisheries Report series. However, there is still far less information available from the recreational fisheries compared to the commercial fisheries.

Most recently, an extensive survey of the daytime recreational fishery in Port Phillip Bay was conducted from 1990 to 1994. A boat and shoreline survey was conducted using aircraft to count boat numbers and roving creel interviews to collect data on numbers of anglers and catch composition in terms of the number of fish, species and size. The surveys were stratified by season and by daytype.

This data has been analysed recently, and a report will be published later this year. Provisional estimates of the annual daytime recreational catch and effort in Port Phillip Bay in 1990-94 ranged between 360-570t, and consisted mostly of sand flathead. Effort estimates ranged from 1.6-2.2 million boat angler hours and 0.5-0.7 million shoreline angler hours.

This estimate may be compared with the commercial catch, excluding pilchards anchovy and sprats, of 423t in 1993/94. The King George whiting catch estimate for the daytime recreational fishery (60t) is equivalent to the commercial catch (58t) in 1993/94. The commercial fishery takes slightly more garfish, mullet, snapper and calamari than the daytime recreational fishery. The species composition of the daytime and night time recreational fisheries and the commercial fisheries are very different with a substantial snapper catch taken at night time by the recreational fishery. New methods of analysis of this data are being developed to provide confidence intervals for the estimates and the database is being extended to include the historical information from 1982/83.

During 1994/95, the recreational monitoring program conducted two summertime surveys based on the bus route method - a night time snapper fishery in Port Phillip Bay and the daytime boat fishery in Corner Inlet. A roving creel daytime survey of the boat fishery in the Gippsland Lakes and an access survey in Portland Bay was also conducted last year. Information from these surveys are currently being analysed and will be completed during 1995. The results will be used in the development of fishery management plans.

The number of surveys has been reduced this year to meet funding allocations. The Gippsland Lakes survey is continuing through the winter, but has been re-focussed at the shoreline fishery. Aerial flights to count boat anglers has been expanded to include Corner Inlet and Wilson's Promontory. Volunteers are being used for the first time during the summer to identify fishing locations and to count shoreline anglers while officers conduct interviews for catch rate and catch composition.

A new initiative to assess the quality of data collected at club competitions will be used to develop a standard data sheet to record catch, effort and catch composition in terms of species and size. Future developments for the program will include an evaluation of the diary survey methods based on the general population or a licence system.

Patrick Coutin
MSL, Queenscliff
Ph (052) 580335
p.coutin@msl.oz.au

Bus Route Survey Workshop

A Workshop to explain the theory and logistics of running a bus-route creel survey was held at the Fisheries Research Institute, Cronulla in July 1995. This survey method was developed in the late 1980s by combining aspects of the access site and roving creel surveys into a format that could be utilised cost-effectively over large geographical areas. The Workshop was attended by Dr Cynthia Jones (Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia) who co-authored the original paper describing this method and was therefore able to offer considerable insight into the method and its uses.

The Workshop was funded by FRDC as a component of the South Australian recreational fisheries programme and was attended by researchers, managers and technical staff from all States and Territories. Proceedings of the Workshop are currently being prepared and should be available early in 1996.