If I remember rightly fisheries are saying it's for a trial period of 12 months only. Still I guess that in 12 months you can do a hell of a lot of damage to the breading stocks, and then we will have the "worlds best controlled fishery" managers jumping up and down and saying the stocks are now unsustainable.

There was no big announcement just a small piece in the paper, and, as far as I know the has been no published scientific data showing that such action will not be harmful.

Now just you get caught with a sertose,tar spot cray and see what fisheries will do to you in the way of a fine. If it's quite safe to take Cray's in this condition why can't the likes of you and me take them as well, Hmmm I guess that might be a bit hard for them to answer (well at least get a straight answer)

 will be buying them to use the roe in their sushi along with the meat!!!! Somebody has found a new market delicacy obviously.

 Cray fisherman are "generaly"very very focused on self regulation in the industry. They have to bewhen theres several million dollars tied up in boats an gear. No such thing as a quick cash grab in fishing lol. If you new what the workload an overheards were :)

Case in point.

Summertime

3am wake up an while skipper fires up mains, one of deckies makes everyones coffies.

3:15am pull chain, an steam out to first string. (deckies are getting bins ready cutting bait,smoke an down coffies.

3:45am pull first string,rebait an shoot, or stack on for moving to new grounds. Depending on numbers.

9am clean down decks,rebait pots,check on how many score in tanks.while skipper cooks breakfast.

10am pull sea anchor,an head to next string rince repeat 2more times that day(without a break).

8pm reqdy for night shot on last string, clean decks cut bait,scub bins,scrub scuppers an general tidyup.

Cook dinner,smoke an bed.

3am....7 days a week for anything up to 4-5 weeks.

So you see, there is no quick cash grab :)

Not into crayfishing myself due to pot thieves etc.

However, the only reason you would target breeding stock is to reduce numbers.

The reports over the last few months suggests it was a bumper season, which would indicate cray prices was lower than in previous years (at least internationally).

Therefore, the best way to increase price is reduce supply.

 It's about increasing the catch rate for the Chinese New Year since they have increased theirquota160 ton it would seem they have to target the breeding stocks to fill it.to me that's not fisheries management it's a cash Grab and I noticed the trial is during the recs closed season out of sight out of mind I guess

.

 No offencemate but uness youve done the job, you really cant get it... Self managment is huge in industry by the vast majority.

The $$we are talking is huge.so no it is not a quick cash grab.

 Non taken but try explaining how targeting the breeding stocks is good management keep in mind this is the same department that said the fishery was on the brink pf collapse only a few years ago Due to low perlus counts

credability non existant , 12 months trial ? for what! think we know the end result !more cash today less crays in the future 

 Oh i dont disagree with you on stupidty ofthe decission. This perticula law has no real sence to it atall. I know a few skippers who will not take females anyway because of the loss of sustained fish.

  Some of the reasons for the changes are,

 Pro cray fishers are trying to reduce there carbon footprint. It costs $6 to lift a cray pot and if you are thowing back your catch the carbon foot print is larger.

 Pro cray fishers are now on a quota and if rec fishers want to keep large females / setose, maybe they should request to go onto a quota eg 20 crays.

 The same excuses are used by rec fishers to catch spawing fish eg dhufish, pinkies, salmon.

 In the future pro cray fishers will probably be using massive pots, massive boats simular to that as deadlist catch.

 Wa lobster boats already use 140 pots. Each pot was about 30kg back in the day. Though i think these days its mostly plasic pots....

Boats can be up to 150 feet but thats a large one. 

As for other guy asked about where i worked, west coast of tasmania an southern ocean... We went to sea for about a month because its more costeffective. 3 weeks fuel cost $5000 so its not cost efective to steam for 2 days back to port to unload till your tanks are full.

as a member of the recreational rock lobster committee we ''the committee '' strongly opposed this move and others by the commercial rock lobster guys when it was raised about 3 years ago

it beggars belief that after some of the biggest changes to the industry and the lowest perueles count only a few years ago these blokes have got there way with the new minister

there can be no justification with the current high numbers of crays on the coast to take setose or tar spot breeders , absolute bullshite move by the commercials

these blokes are making millions , and have overseen some of the worst crashes in their industry and still they don't get it , just greed ,

let the big girls breed several times each season , leave the tar spot setose mummas in the water ..to increase the biomass back p to its pre fishing level of yesteryear ,

none of us will have bad years again if they do this ,the biomass will be large and healthy

why steal from future generations to line your pockets now ?/

hezzy

 Basically greedy stupid barstards Hezzy , worked in the industry and yep g reed winsout every time .

 Tassy i'm not sure how long ago you worked in the industry mate but you seem pretty removed from the cray industry i was involved in and also what happens in WA...

I couldnt agree more with Hezzy...

Jetty rat if they wanted to reduce their carbon footprint then perhaps they'd reduce the horses and reduce the size of the boats they fish...

They dont need to fish shit weather, its only greed to fish crap now when the price is high...

Take it from one who worked in the industry for thirty years, 26 of those as a skipper, some of you don't seem to have a clue about this, which is understandable.
I spent a lot of my working crayfishing life involved in the management side of things, including working with the researchers, and would be better qualified to comment on this than any one else who has posted in this thread thus far, regardless of whether you have served on a recco's committee or not.
Generally speaking, the industry supported the protection of oversize females and setose when it was introduced, for obvious reasons. But, as the years went on, and the number of o/s females kept growing, it became obvious it was a problem which would only get worse. The large animals dominate the reef habitat, and actively force the smaller animals out to less desirable real estate, in crayfish terms, which affects growth rates and mortality. They are actually not as fecund as a smaller mature animal, generally only breeding once a year, where the younger more vigorous animals will breed multiple times. You could fish an edge where tagging had been done for several consecutive years, and you would just keep catching the same old big, tagged females, only getting to keep the big males which may be among them. Returns from fisheries showed that they were just not moving.

Just looked at the release--removing restriction on taking of oversize females--ONLY MENTIONS RELAXATION OF TAKING OF SETOSE JULY 1-NOVEMBER 14 . So what this means is that you'll probably actually keep very few O/S females anyway.
O/S female's will often not moult until well into the reds, as they are only moulting once a year, so if you want to cull the fat old cows out you will need to allow the taking of setose all year which they are not doing --my experience showed me that they will often moult late, and go straight into a setose state. You would be throwing back bags of them every day, working the deep April leading into May,and then suddenly they would be all fresh shell, and setose. So you will only be able to retain them July-Nov, and I'm guessing that there is little market for them at that time , low price, so they will be returned anyway. For the record, I do not agree with the taking of setose in the time they have allowed--they are fresh setose, ready to spawn, at that time of year. Way back, when the season ran until mid-July, the factory floor would be covered in berry, which came out during tailing of the catch.

I notice no-one says a thing when someone happily posts up photos of lots of big bucks taken during the whites, when they come out to chase the whites around.

As to the lazy, greedy bastards, etc, comments, I'll just let that go. Except to say that fisherman can only react to what the fisheries impose on them--the quota system means you HAVE to fish when the price is high, because, on such a low quota, you need to maximise the dollars on every kilo. Over the decades, it has always been about adapting to what they throw at you, and still survive. A lot didn't when quotas were introduced-- I got out before that happened, just could handle the constant financial stress.

Most of you are Perth-based, by the sound of it--trust me, there is more to the breeding stock than what you see in the shallows around Rotto. Huge stocks exist further north of the Abrolhos, in a large area which has been closed for years, now,(ever heard of Big Bank?) not to mention all the deep water ground inside and nor-east of it which just doesn't get fished much any more--crays are, generally speaking, too big to be worth anything most of the year, but there are plenty of them. Fisheries researchers believed that Big Bank breeding stock alone could sustain the industry , which was why it was closed, and now seems to be forgotten. Except by those who used to fish it.

I doubt a 12 month trial taking the big girls will make a dent on anything--just remember that it is a kilo-based quota, every big female will mean two or more other legal-size crays returned. Taking of setose during winter? Not a fan, but remember,once you have caught your quota, that's it for the year--this is not carte blanche to slaughter the breeding stock, just a way of keeping some supply to market, allowing fishermen more flexibility in trying to plan their year. Throwing back 2/3 of your catch means you won't fish that period-allowing you to keep setose means some effort will be removed from the earlier part of the season--there will be plenty to go around.

I dont fish in Perth, I am retiered now because of the life. Screwed my body.... But that is how it worked in Tasmania. As for calling Cray Fishermen greedy bastards. I personally find it bloody insulting. You have no idea how hard we work for people to go into a shop an buy fish... We get paid FA compared to the work load. So please dont call people who work a life most of you could not do, greedy  till you do it ok?...

edited after cooling down...

Ranmar, when did quota's come in in WA ? do they have to bid on them or is it jsut handed out to each boat on pot numbers an boat size?...When I worked in Tassy, we had really good quota's so it was usually not a problem.Dead loss/personal keepers/food onboard factored in we usually had it pretty easy filling them.

I left the industry in 2005(?) quotas came in 2009(?)just from memory. They had been talked about for a long time, and the sort of catch per pot they were talking was way below what I could make money on. We had a run of bad years early in the noughties at Kalbarri when they were absolutely creaming it further south, due to a few years of strong Leeuwin current pushing all the settlement south. Made money the last year I was in, but I was over the stress.
The people who are doing well out of it now are those who are leasing out their pots--the lessors, not the lessees. As usual. Break-even point now would be well in excess of $40/kg for lessees, depending on your running costs and debt. So don't think people are getting rich when the price is $60/kg--you don't have many kg to play with under current quota.
The quota was set on pot ownership, but at least it was on total holdings--we worked under an 82% limit for many years, that is, you paid to lease/or owned 100 pots, but you could only work 82. The lease price was set on total holdings, so if the nominal price per pot to lease for a year was $2,400, you were actually paying over $2,900 per pot for the pots you were allowed to work. We never had the sort of prices they have now, anything over $25/kg was brilliant. Quota has been split between reds and whites now, but the original quota was, if I recall correctly, 120kg/pot. Fishermen stop and start all the time, with such a low kg/pot, as soon as the price drops below whatever you have planned on, you have to leave the gear on the back of the boat. Very stop-start business.

There was a stupid limit on pots vs boat length for many years--measured from stem to rudder post, it led to boats being built with big overhangs . Or , if you wanted a bigger boat, you had to buy more pots. It was relaxed in later years to a more sensible limit, and then dropped completely, put as many pots as you wanted on any size boat. This led to a big reduction in total fleets numbers, because the average size grew and they each had more pots, which led to a lot of businesses in the support industry just disappearing, less boats to maintain. Went from around 670 in the early eighties to a couple of hundred now. The beaurocrats, and that is all the Fisheries Department are, love it, less to administer, less annoying "stakeholders" to have to deal with. And they are good at getting it wrong--anyone remember the "endangered" whalers?

ranmar

iv fished for crays for 40 years, down south ,have good mates in the industry as well as worked on commercial boats so i have a few clues

you know as well as i do taking setose crays is not good , it is not neccesary with the industry as it is today ,
the bigger females down here breed several times a season , we get them all through the year , , their are research papers that support that .
down south here our cray numbers have been decimated at times by the industry , by blokes who could take what they could catch with no limits ,that was greed , pure as imho not all but many .. now they have a quota to fish all year if managed corectly they should not need to fish setose at all

this taking setose is purely to keep catches up when the best/highest price is available to them on the year round market ,

down south here given the biomass build up from around the early 90s, when the tar spot setose rule was introduced , it peaked in the 2000s, we had a rash of boats from the north move down here [south of bunbury ] and flogg the biomass into the ground in under 4 years, catch rates dropped dramatically , you know this
the perueles count dropped , fisheries themselves did not know why , still a calculated guess as to why

norman moore finally brought in qoutas, and rationalised the industry , gave it a year round season ,
now they are pushing to take the setose all year round every year, , that is not good imo ,

oue climate is changing , water temps are changing along our coast , anyone who thinks this new move is ok is just not thinking ,
why put it to risk ??

also how many crays land on the wa market ?? who can afford crays to buy ?? the indsutry has put prices so high the locals who cant /dont catch their own can not afford to buy them ? is that the best use of a natural resource by one industry for all west australians ?? i think not , show me a poor crayfishermen ??
the industry players are making good money now of the back of a natural resource that most west australians cant buy , becuase the bulk of it goes overseas , is that greed ?

rec get to have 5% of the total catch in wa , the rest is taken from all west australians natural resource in the ocean by the industry and sold to other markets , so the industry is not really servicing the wa public at all imo

time has shown the industry does not self manage very well , this is another example of that
big crays are highly priced on the asian market , so it suits the industry to take em , they dont do it for our benefit at all

time will tell where this move will lead the biomass and our future catches

hezzy

 Hezzy didn't know there was a rec committee for crays is it part of rec fish if you guys were responsible for the extra month and the diving for them at the abrols oh and the extra boat limit then a big thank you and keep up the good work. Lets hope the dip shits at the fisheries dept don't screw it up for the sake of afew hungry gutted pros feeding  the insatiable Chinese market

stricko

yes mate ,thanks for the feedback ..
the rock lobster committee is an offshoot of recfishwest, it was set up back in around 2012 to give feedback & policy direction to the board at recfishwest on rock lobster management as part of the shared resource with the commercials under IFM

the committee is made up of volunteers like myself who have experience in rock lobster , either as recs , science or managers , but all have fished for crays one way or anther

the fisheries dept accepted our recomendations as part of a package back a few years ago to increase the catch % for recs as we where not takign our full 5% of the total allowed sustainable harvest each year

it has been good to see the rules changed and accepted by rec fishers , it was also good for people to see in real ways that recfishwest is making positive changes to rec access/sustainable fishing

hezzy

The fishery from Bunbury south has historically been very hit and miss. It appears to rely on very large whites migrations--when the migrating mass reaches a certain size, it heads south instead of the normal nor-west, and you have the monster deepwater whites runs, the stuff of legends. The leftovers of these runs will migrate back inshore and settle. When this happens, they will be found and caught. You should know this from the boom/bust nature of the fishery down there. The period you refer to coincides with a run like that, maybe mixed in with good settlement conditions. It is widely believed, with good reason, the biomass south of Rottnest actually doesn't matter very much to recruitment at all, as anything spawned there either just gets swept away into the southern ocean, or hits water which is too cold and dies. The spawning mass which matters extends from about 90 miles nor'west of Kalbarri, down to Perth. Anything else, from south of Naturaliste or Big Hill to Shark bay in the north,, is at the very limits of distribution--crays will be larger, lower density, as any animal at the limits of it's distribution. Catching rates will vary considerably. Exception is where exceptionally large migrations in either direction spread animals further than normal--this is well recorded from Shark Bay, which is either boom or bust, (mostly bust). Their recruitment does not come from settlement, but migration. Did you know that the puerulus station at South Passage, while it still existed, consistently recorded very high levels of settlement , but the expected catch four years later never, ever, eventuated? It is a very harsh environment, none of the fringing sheltering reefs that the little ones need to settle and thrive, and mortality would be huge. Kind of like Naturaliste-Leeuwin? Big swells, no cover? The crays have to migrate from elsewhere, and if they are fished down, it needs another big migration to replenish. It only matters to the local fishermen--they see "their" stock being fished down, but that is a purely local issue, one they can't do anything about, and one which really doesn't matter to the big picture of breeding stock. The crays you are catching there may have been spawned 800 kms away--there is no "local" breeding stock keeping "local" catches up in this fishery, it gets spread far and wide. We had a bad run 2002-2004, while "down south" was killing it, whites and reds--a strong Leeuwin current had swept all the settlement south, for a few years, and we weren't seeing any undersize in the runup to those bad years.

I did say I wasn't a fan of retaining setose, but gave my interpretation of why they are doing it--it is nothing like pre-quota days, where, if you could have kept setose, you would have slaughtered them. The realities of quota fishing will probably limit this damage, for the reasons I have given.

ranmar

lol , yes iv had strong discussions with several marine biologists about the crays breeding south of cape nato not contributing to the bio mass ,
to me its a moote point , the crays do breed very successfully down here, we see it every year, while i agree the result is scattered far and wide along the wa coast, those crays breeding here nature intended them to breed and contribute to the biomass, regardless of what the curent knowledge among fisheries scientist think , nature knows best imo , when we muck with it we do so at our peril

down south has had varying years that is true, however it needs to weighed up by several factors other than what you mentioned

before the 90s when the zones where in down here there where many cray boats fishing ,they caught as much as they could and sold it for whatever the market set at the time , minimum regulation on their catch ,

around the late 80s, early 90s up to 11 licences where removed from the idustry south of augusta , this had an impact on the stock taken , then in the mid 90s approx , the fisheries put in place tighter regs around the tar spot/ setose , escape gaps etc this was also combined with several smaller 60-90 pot licences getting out of the industry here , our catches went up in correlation to these combinations of influences on the stock [in 1980s we had about 25 boats in the capes area... 2015 0 boats ]

these changes with the favourable leeuwin current lead to a large build up of crays on the capes, then in 2000 the processers started giving out info about the huge catches down here , the place was invaded by about 50 boats fishing it hard up to 3000kg a day , this went on until catches dropped off to bugger all by 2005 or so jumbos where non existent , catches in general where low

its taken 10 years , with virtually no commercial catches here for the stock to build up again to good levels here , regardless of the leeuwin currents etc

this new change has the potential to again put stocks at risk imo
the commercial guys have used it to trade off getting their catches sooner , supposedly to take gear out for the whale migration entaglements, how many whales get tangled in pro gear each year and die ??

it would be interesting to see if the time lines between july 1 and nov 14 coincide with less lobster on the market from NZ or the US being availble into the asian market etc & the local industry being able to supply large quantitys of lobster setose included at peak breeding time that arnt tar spot to that market to gain max top dollar , the whale angle is dubious imo

maybe im too sceptical, lol

hezzy

 You'd be right about the NZ factor, they (and south oz) always did really well on price when the WA industry was shut for winter--their prices reportedly plummetted 15th Nov, or so I am told.  What you are saying tallies more or less with what I have heard over the years, with the old "D" zone in place. And yes, the whale entanglement thing is a bit of a furpy, the northwards migration is normally well offshore, not many come closer in until they get up north of Kalbarri--the deep water gets closer to the coast as you go up, They only get inshore in any real numbers on the return, where cows and calves hug the coast, resting up in what few bays there are on the long journey south.

The depletion of the stocks between the capes was probaby unavoidable, given the increasingly mobile nature of the fleet as the average boat got larger, although my impression of most C zone boats was daytrip only, minimal tanks, only a main engine driven pump feeding them,, no auxiliaries--makes it hard to sustain for long away from your home port. Which is no consolation for the boats who just want to live in that area and make a living from it without moving far. The bigger northern B zone boats were real travellers, doing 3-5 days a time at sea, anchoring up in the open sea at night--tough life. We just had to live with that--they would be 100  miles away, then on top of you the next day if they got wind of something good happening. Fact of life. And if the numbers build up between the capes again, they will be back.

Historically, the industry was very divided between C zone, and A/B zone--when we started getting together in the eighties with the Rock Lobster Consultative Committee, and actually started talking, it became obvious why we often seemed to be pulling in different directions at times--we were fishing rather differently. The only ones who knew it all were the old freezer boat  pirates fishermen , who dated back to days before zones. When zoning arrived, they mostly elected to fish B zone, as they had the far north to themselves, and used to kill it. All those crays with short carapaces and heavy tails

ranmar,

yeh agree with alot of the above

the problem i see is when the biomass increases their will be pressure put on the minister to increase the TAC , or quota above what it is now , push it out to the limits ,

that would only need abad leeuwin current or hot water temps as we have had in the alst few years at times to do major damage to the biomass along the entire coast

the whale thing seems like atrade off to get the top dollar hoping it wont affect the biomass, is that greedy ?/

well let others judge it

one of my good mates is john allchin, you may know him also ?

hezzy

I would like to thank both of you for your contributions to this subject.
Both of you have put up some very informed cases for and against and your reasons for taking such a point of view.
To me, it's a pleasure reading posts from to very knowable people without the character assignations which unfortunately sometimes occur by people who are very passionate about the matter being discussed, their passion for the subject being talked about must is also acknowledged.

As is the very solid back ground of hezzy and ranmar850.

I'm just a rec cray catcher who's understanding of how the current situation has come into being has been improved 100% + by what I've just read.

 I think mother nature has a way of panning things out, only when man tries to play god things go pear shape.

I bet I could find it if I went through the old minutes and records. But up at the northern end of the fishery, we did tend to live in our own world, until we got involved with the bigger picture. Hell, in later years, I used to go all the way to Dongara for a while, in the whites.:-)
Yeah, anything to do with whales get top press, you only need one tangled and certain factions are howling for blood. Or a pot-robbing seal.
And I agree about the warm water--we had very high temperatures late nineties for two years with a very strong Leeuwin Current--it was likely what caused the crash of 2002-2005, just no settlement. It actually changed things permanently, fish wise. Undersize tropical species turned up in big numbers, and stayed. Big red-throats (nor'west snapper) had always been plentiful beyond 24 fathoms, but never in the shallows--suddenly, we were inundated with 200cm long juveniles all the way into the beach anywhere past 25 miles north of town. And they stayed, and grew. Red Emperor numbers definitely went up, as did Rankins cod. Blokes were losing crays in their tanks for a while, temps hit 28 degrees. It all returned to normal for years, then we had the massive Ab kill a few years back, that led to the closure of the entire northern fishery. Hot water, in an unfortunate convergence of very calm water/no swell/low tides/hot weather and the abs just died on the platforms. It has happened before, but never on this scale, and just wiped them out. They may never recover, as there was no breeding stock left north of Kalbarri. Fisheries don't really seem to know whether the spat travel far before settling--if they don't they will never come back.

 Ranmar,

You have alot to offer on the above subject but i feel your not really telling it how it is today...

What ever happened way back when doesnt affect the now...

I know it may be very hard to have seen what you have through your career and you would find it difficult speaking in anyway other than in a slightly bias way ( i mean no offence here mate ) but I agree with Hezzy, this is all about the $$ margins and nothing else...

A point that i think has been missed here ( i've skimmed through as there was alot to read ) is the split prices that i assume happen here as they do on the otherside of the country...

In SA the optimum price is for the 1.5kg - approx 2.2 kg fish, next best is from the measure and up to 1.5, the worst being the largest size...

We were always throwing back the big fish and keeping the cream to up the $$ average over the season.

Your arguement about the bigger fish being territorial and pushing smaller fish out is a problem might ring true but if the big fish keep getting thrown back because ( call it what you will ) greed/business management then of course problems will be created...

What Hezzy says about the price of our resource being pushed out of consumers reach is a sore point, same goes for our 5  star finfish but thats another story...

And also the point Hezzy made about show me a poor crayfisherman is also one well made...

I certainly dont be grudge a family being succesful but come on... 

 Prices on lobster that you see in shops is i am sure everyone knows,nothing remotly like what we got. I dont know what fishers get paid now but to give you an idea. Back when i did it, we got 18$ a kilo.. The price in shops for same fish....48$. Lobster fishermen by an large donot get rich. But they work damn hard for it.so if tey have been given rights to take a percentage of females....i may not agree with it on sustainability grounds, but for the licence holders paying those 1.5-2 mil bank loans i get it.

I am aazed you think cray fisherman are all rich. Over the lietime of my job, an im 48 now. I dot wn a house, i drive a shitbox car.....so tell e exactly where are my millions :)

 Lobster fisherman by in large dont get rich??

Tassy i'm not sure where you been hiding or how far and wide your knowledge of the Cray industry is??

A boat came in down here with $90,000 of crays on the otherday, not a bad days work one would say...

Yep sure he's no doubt left at daylight and worked his 10 hour day but i'd say thats a tad higher than your average hourly rate...

Where i'm from in SA all the fathers are off the boat by the time they in their 50's and the sons run the boat, why because they can...

Back there a hundred pot license has a quota of around the 130kg/pot so 100 pots = 13 T...

My mates would have averaged $80 + this year easily and caught the 13 T in around 80-90 days fishing, some lot less some alot more...

Thats over a million bucks in 3 months...

Expenses - 

Bait - ( tax deduction ) lets be conservative here - 100 pots - 1.5kg of bait / pot @ say $3 kg = $4.50 a pot x 100 = $450 day...

Fuel - ( tax deduction ) Most of my mates are fishing from about 5am - 1pm - lets say they are using 50 L/hr = $400ltrs / $600 

Wages - Son 20% 

Decki - 10% 

Rough calculation 

$12,500 /day gross

Minus wages - $4000 = $8500

Minus expenses ( 70% of ) $700/day

Thats around about $7800/day...

Not bad for kicking back at home...

License fee's are under 20k ( tax deducion )

So 85 days x $7800 = $663,000 gross

They have bulk tax deductions outside of the day to day, most have farms they use to write tax off...

I'm not the full bottle in the West but i do spend alot of time in Gerro and always make the trip to the marina as i'm always interested in boats of all sizes but here they are mostly big and bigger...

Tassy you sound like you fished in a time when conventional hulls were common, economical though slow...

Deaths were common as boys pushed hard back then, now mate she's a totally different industry...

My inlaws are farmers, they have sooooooo much more risk and life is so much more of a gamble...

The cray fisherman of today generally have it pretty good and all they do is harvest...

 --the split pricing usually means the very smallest legaLsize are kept, so even if the larger fish are legal (non-setose, or spawning) they are thrown back. High-grading, all the time. So, if a window of opportunity presents itself to market the larger fish at a good price, it should be taken. It normally is a small window anyway. 

You may have gained the impression that my perspective is outdated, but I still live in the same house, in the same town, and talk to the same fishermen I used to work alongside; the ones that are still in it, that is.  So I'm not totally out of touch. And it is a business, it has to be about the dollars, no-one does it for the fun of it. So if the dollars can be made in a sustainable way, why not. There was a real shaake-out period to start with when quotas came in a lot of people went broke, lost everything. Prices weren't what they are now, that's for sure. Very glad I'd got out. Now? Still glad, a lot of risk; we rely on asia for our price, and it is fragile. Remember SARS? Or Avian flu? First thing people did was  stop buying crayfish, prices crashed. No-one could survive on the prices the local market is willing to pay. Farming?-always a gamble, I married into a farming and fishing extended family many years ago, know all about the risk.

 Wait, his son is. On 20& ?? He better be Head decki from god for that. It took me 6 years to get onto 18 percent. Dont forget to most deckies are on percentage not flat wage so if no fish no pay.. You dont earn that sorta cash every day. Cray fishing seems to be a complete contradiction to the job over here..what i mean is, crays have always been easiest job in fishing, but side effect of that is much less pay than other forms.

 80 foot boats 100-140 pots day trip, prolly 6-7 hours to pull then reset....(only going on personal experiance for those numbers)...not sure how many score 90k is these days,but we got piad after boat bills are paid, so while we might have 90k for instance...if boat fees are 25k say, then out 10-15-18percent actally come out of 65k... 

I dont buy for one second that that is average boats take home per day.I made 22.5k for 4 months on prawns in gulf of carp,an that was n mid 90s.no chance crays outpay prawns today. (i will ask my mate in queens wat the rate is today on them. But they have always been much higher pay..

So at end of day its one of three things. 

#1 i am cronicaly out of date

#2perth cray industry is massivly out of wak with east states.

#3 prices on crays massively inflated to what Tassy is. An down there we export around....75-80 percent to japan

I dont doubt its likily all 3 options, but things are obviosly much diff here. Life seems a little easier than it was. I am sure its still a hard job but if your right the pay is far out o lin for my day. An we worked insane hours fo weeks at a tie. None of this day trip stuff :( we would coe in unload, restock fuel,food bait,water etc an back out if the numbers were good.

Rob come on mate....

Of the 250 + lisences in Southern Zone SA there would be very few that change hands on any regular basis...

In the West like i've stated above I'm not the full bottle so i'll state that here again but...

Are you saying that there is a high percentage of new guys within the industry that are buying into the industry?

Not leasing, buying?

My guess is no...

Bugger all...

So we need to feel sorry for business owners that put their neck on the line and have to cover 2.4 million?

Good on them for taking the plunge but they know what they are getting into one can only assume...

The major majority of long term cray fishing families around the country are doing very well and for that reason changing the rules makes no sense to me!

 Ranmar i wasn't trying to shoot you down i can tell your knowledge and passion runs deep...

I was saying it can be hard to speak in opposition to something close to the heart...

Its hard to get a point across typing, isnt it Tassy 

:)

 Lol i know i come across a bit short, but what i lack in english ability to expain... I make up for in stuboness an determination heh

 All good mate,

Hey i dont suppose you worked on any of Roughie boats back in the day out of St Helens?

The name Jimmy or Nathan Colins doesnt ring a bell...

Jimmy ended up with one of the Ranger boats down there.

 Na i was out in southern ocean working on a supply ship back then called The Enterprise. An allied fisheries steel hull 142 foot boat. Bitch of a thing, rode rougher an harder n a kingscross hooker at an xmas party lol.

I did work unloading roughys for a while on docks in hobart, smelly bloody things they were..

Names dont ringa bell sorry, but then i didnt work east cost, one of my old skippers put my name about up there because i grassed him up to fisheries for having 15 score of undersize. I came back to boatafter making call then told i quit, btw fsheries are on their way.

So he screwed me on east coast ol.

I did do some long lining out on seaward side of shouten sle for a year though..

 Chipping in on percentages.. The boat I worked on for years my mate (head decky and owers son) was on 8% and I was on 7.. Last year with a fresh decky cos I left he went up to 9 and the new decky went to 6. My mate grossed 135k and worked once or twice a week for most of the year.. This year as prices are higher again they have been dropped a % and he still recons he will make 130k plus.. They as far as I know are some of the highest % deckys I know.. Most have been dropped to 3 to 5%. Reason being 1 a decky can't make 250k a year its just not what happens in life. And 2 lease prices are so high now the deckys would make more then some skippers.. Of which I know a couple that are only on 10% them selfs this year..

good thread seems none of us are far apart in our thinking that taking setose is a bad move ?

you hear the money /big risk viewpoint all the time , personally I don't begrudge these guys making a good living out of it , they usually are good blokes who work hard , however when it comes to putting the entire biomass at risk by taking potential breeders out of the system at a peak breeding time between july and nov , you have to say its certainly a risky move aimed at the money not sustainability of the industry

see the fisheries dept are under resourced , their science is not rock solid, its pretty good , but not infallible , plenty of old knowledge has gone from the dept , their research has farmore pressure now that ever before , when you get blokes like nic caputi saying he did not know what was causing the low perueles count a few years ago , it make you sit back and take note , now their science has a theory ,

how accurate is their theory ?/well that's debatable , like the hot water temps /currents , they didn't predict them an cant do so now accurately , so possibly the entire mid west abalone population is gone as ranmar said or at least severly affected for how long ??

if the same type of scenario was to happen to the cray biomass , how badly would it crash all along the coast ? thy don't know , see lots of people get into these positions and are making big decisions without a large reference groups input into those decisions , just handful of peeps get to make these reccomendations to the dept or minister of the day ...its higly suss imho that the best interests of the industry are put before the best interests of the biomass/fishery , that might sound like bullshite , but is how it is often enough ime

this latest decision was traded off to help keep less whale entangled ??? really ?? how many whales actually get entangled and drown off our coast ?? seems a hard answer to get today ??

anyone know ?? they don't seem to ??

im very sceptical this move will be a good one and I think the dept should have stuck with it as it was

ranmar, john Allchin fished from jurien to shark bay , he was one of the early pioneers at the islands along with maurie glazier , sid liddon etc

he wrote a great book called ''away with the albatross'' about his life &fishing at the islands he was based at post office with his boat dufken he left the industry in 85 , john is now in his 80s amazing guy !!!

hezzy

id reccomend you have a read im sure you would enjoy it

 My Uncle works for Penguin books in Melb Hezzy I'll get him to chase it up, sounds like my sort of read.

If you know locally where i might be able to source the book please let me know.

Thanks for your input Belly as a recent deckie in this state.

TB

something else that needs to be addressed on the commercial boats imo is a return shute /waterslide for crays that are not kept for whatever reason

how many crays are damaged or predated by the current unregulated way deckies can throw them back ?
it would be a simple enough design to incorporate some sort of water slide into a boats deck to drop these unwanted crays back down under the hull and into the drink ,

how many are damaged , killed or eaten ?
surely the industry could design something simple that works ?

belly your info highlights the dollars involved these days and pressure boats are under to push the limits to get more coin coming in , any way they can if its legal

hezzy

tim

try here

http://www.abebooks.com/9780957961104/Away-Albatross-Allchin-John-0957961103/plp

http://www.gidgenet.com.au/albatrossbooks/

http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/2977337

hezzy

Thanks Hezzy i'll look now,

While we're throwing stones....

In the SE of South oz where i grew up you can drive on hundreds of km's of beach ( good mully fishing ) and the floatsam is mad...

I think a levy should come out of any professional/recreational ocean user to employ beach combers...

We had a hard hat blow off a blokes head a fewmonths ago Offshore and Apache was fined $10,000

We had another one blow off a little while later but i left that facility before the fine had been enforced but no doubt it was higher than first offence...

Keep Australia beautiful i say and just because no body takes responsibily doesnt mean the junk doesnt belong to someone and allowed to remain...

 Sorry Rob,  I'd re-freshed my thingo a few times and for some reason its not until now i've spotted your reply...

I'm replying back to your 10% equity reply because unfortunately its only come through days later...

( do any otherguys have bad delays on the forums here )

Rob if you gave me cash and i said i'd give you a 10% return you'd be mad not to take it right??

Anyone thats prepared to outlay $4 Mill has surely done their homework....

I'll go you halvies Rob...

Exactly.... Thats my point so all this carry on aboutall these cray fisherman having these massive loans and huge risk is really only a poofteenth %of the bigger picture...

Rules can't be made/changed because we feel sorry for the very few...

 Rob whats the minimum lisence size in the west?

How many pots?

What is a pot worth over here nowadays?

How many kegs quota do the boys get with that said pot here currently?

rob ,

while I get what your saying ,

id be thinking any one like ranmar who was''in the game '' for so long walked away quite ok ,

most of the long term players have made very good money of what is essentially a public resource, that nature replentishes for them

fishermen don't need to fence anything , they don't buy any of the biomass to start breeding a herd of their own stock , they don't fertilise , or have to spray etc etc

if the weather is shite they can choose to not fish , and it wont affect the biomass or natural resource nature gives them to harvest

thy essentially do very little to creat that resource /biomass other than follow the management plan on their particular species that they harvest , to make a buck , yes they spend money to buy in, gear etc, but their still taking a ''free ''resource owned by all of us under licence

the high buy in price reflects that industry ability to make big returns ,
if you fished long term you should have made good money, worked for it , but still be well off ime of cray boys & deckies

hezzy

 Agree Hezzy unless the quotas forced guys to require more pots to legally fish at a time returns werrn't high and or interest rates were high...

We can cancel out the last two...

Tassy dont get me started on the AB divers...

 Lol ab diver in tassy (good ones) work 6 months a year,but sine many of em are shot in thier bodys by late 30s.. I dont begrudge it. I worked as a deckie for a diver for a while.. It was a bitch of a job lol

 Tassy have another boags you mad man...

Hezzy is simply saying that with the quota system  if they look out their windows and the Cuban cigar is hard to light as she's blowing they can choose to stay home mate as they get the quota anyway...

The reason they will fish is if the price is high then the weather doesnt seem so bad anymore.... 

:)

 Mate your part of the wrong gen...

Those were the good ol days bud.....

tassy , mate

its not personal at you ,.... show me where I said it was easy buddy ?/or that your all millionares ?/

I had my cfl for 5 years, tassy ,

you seem to be getting your own fishing experience crossed over with the conversation about the crays boys here in wa which I don't think you have ever fished ???or have you ?fished here in wa for crays on a boat ?? ever been out on a wa cray boat tassy

no offence mate , but if your commercial catch rate was as low as your rec catch rate in wa , I can see why you did it hard ,lol

hezzy

 No wonder he's wanting long lines Hezzy...

:)

lol no I am responding to your comments about how easy fisherman have it... TO answer your Q, no I have not fished in WA, an yes I understand they do it very differnt here. I am not arguing that. But you seem to have a idea in your head, that fisherman are all swiminign in cash. This is wrong on so many levels. I am not talking about just WA as I have said I have no experiances with how it works here.... But theres other fisherman outside WA:).

As for my catch rate.... LOL not asure if your having a dig, or joking, but either way ill take it as funny :).

But I honestly dont think you understand how hard the job can be....an how hard they work for their money... Be it Tassy WA or eastern states....

BTW Yes I am am a dinosaur .... my generation actually worked for a living :p

now, if you'll exuse me, its 4:45am an I have to drive to Ascott... for my morning fish heh

 Pots worth around $50 000 each southern zone quota is 88kgs per pot. Northern zones are 108kg per pot. Min licence 80 pots I think. Yep it's Hollywood now for the ones that own everything, for people leasing pots most are slowly getting out. Not worth it. Yep I don't agree with taking setose. Plenty of crays they need to leave breeders alone. 

 Hey Rob when you say you need to own 75 to fish 63 doesn that mean you still have a quota for 75 or 63?

Like for example in SA you are allowed to own 120 pots @ a certain kg per pot but only allowed to fish 100 pots throughout the season to get your 120 pot quota.

To me that makes no sense as its all on a quota anyway...

Was the reduction in lisence size because the general view was WA lisences were too big?

Fishing a 180 pots seems madness to me but hey they were allowed to do it...

How many pots you fish back in the day Tassy, 60 - 70?

na only 40. Were not allowed more than 40 back then. Our boats were only 60-65 feet, an mother ships were 120-150.... but they were not allowed to fish only supply the fleet/prosess the fish.

Keep in m ind though, we stayed out anything up to 5 weeks or more sometimes... Deadloss becomes a factor after 2 weeks, so the motherships were a huge bonus for us.

 Can you imagine fishing 180 pots?

The most I fished was 77 and that was enough, mind you that was mostly on the inside ground below 40 fath, I also used to fish the deep on a boat that fished about 60 and we'd kill the pig out there but loooong loooong days, now they dont want the speckly crays anyway only the shallow dark reds...

eh it isnt to bad. Most times it took about 4 hours to pull 40...rebait an set. You get into a rythem after a while with two working deck... its much worse when your working deck alone lol.....took me 6 hours to do 40 alone with Skipper staying in weelhouse...I couldnt do 40 now let alone 180.... But back then.... yer dont see any problem. Just a long day...

whats new :)

Seeing that most of the recruitment for WRL comes from an area north of the Abrolhis or as I understand it as zone A maybe females should be protected in that zone but part of the take in the southern zones.

 so many posts but still no one that thinks it's a good idea and as hessy pointed out this stupid idea was brought up3 years ago when the future of crayfishing both commercial and recreational wasn't looking good .so calling the people who pushed this through greedy pricks and the department that passed it fuckwits well walks like a duck quacks like a duck I'll call it a duck. 

latest update for those who are interested

i tend to agree with dr jim penn on setting a % of the comercial catch aside stricly for the wa market , given its a community resource , at present it is priced way to high for the average non fisher to afford buying crays very often

not os keen to see the TAC increased though
hezzy
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https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/27455972/set-cray-quota-for-wa-market/

One of WA's top fisheries experts has called for a portion of the State's rock lobster catch to be set aside for the local market amid fears consumers cannot afford skyrocketing prices.

Jim Penn, an emeritus director with the Department of Fisheries, said the rock lobster industry could become a victim of its own success as the local community was priced out of the market.

Dr Penn yesterday gave a presentation to a trans-Tasman industry conference where he said retailers were resorting to imported product from the US in the face of prices of up $80 for locally caught crayfish.

He suggested that part of the annual catch be quarantined to offset the trend, saying it was important consumers enjoyed the benefits of the fishery as well as the fishers.

"The community owns the resource," Dr Penn said. "The commercial sector has rights to fish it - and appropriately so.

"But at the same time, the Government needs to look at the bigger picture and say, 'We're satisfying the recreational sector, we're satisfying the commercial sector - how do we satisfy the local market?' "

WA's commercial rock lobster fishers are allowed to take about 6000 tonnes a year after their catch was roughly halved in 2009 because of plummeting stocks.

Dr Penn said the smaller catches, together with booming demand for WA crayfish from China, had seen prices reach unprecedented heights and made the fishery one of the most lucrative in the world.

He claimed the allowed catch had been set too conservatively and there was room to increase it.

He said the extra quota should be dedicated to the local market, arguing that while it might not fetch the same prices as those offered in China it could still be fished profitably.

Dr Penn warned the success of the industry could inadvertently fuel a black market as criminal elements capitalised on high prices.

Western Rock Lobster Council boss John McMath backed calls for the catch to be lifted but said no discussions had been held about domestic reservations.

"Certainly I think it's something industry would be prepared to at least discuss and I'm sure that would be a very robust discussion," he said.

not sure about raising the limits but on the surface (dedicating a portion to local market) looks to be a good proposition.

Seems to have been a long time coming and would certainly help other small businesses as well . restaurants etc.

Market price in KALBARRI last I was there $43/ half at local restaurant. (didn't pay much attention so the price could be out a bit but do remember it being ridiculous in Kalbarri of all places.)

Firstly let me say that I'm putting my view forward from a position of never been involved with the rock lobster (cray) industry.

I think the idea of making the resource available for the local market via a lower price is a good idea.
However is it fair to ask people who have invested huge amounts of money to take a cut in the rewards for their investment and effort, I don't think so.

If the T A C is to be increased then perhaps the increase could be quarantined for the local market only.

Those who wish to enter the rock lobster fleet to catch for the local market only be given restricted licences to do so.
From what I have read the good professor is of the opinion that selling the catch for this market can be done profitably.
Those who are fishing and supplying the export market are not disadvantaged by the changing of the goal posts.
Those who enter the domestic market only catch, know before they enter the fishery that their catch is for sale to the domestic market only.

Just my view and as I have stated I know nothing of the way the cray fishery operates and its costs.
The thing I do know is that the cost of having a cray served up at a restaurant is prohibitive to average wage earner.

Too many females, not enough males?