Opera house bycatch statistics

[rayke1938]

I have been red clawing at NPD for quite a long time now and in that time my total by catch is

2 water rats one this year because I had my pot in shallow water 80mm ring in trap.The other several years ago and no details known.

1 lungfish entered torn pot and released ok. It probably could have got out by itself and may have been having a feed of bait or red claw.

A few tandanus all released alive.

Probably 100 or so juvenile tilapia. ( Good thing and all killed)

I waterbird that had its hooked beak caught in a fabric mesh shrimp trap and drowned.

Note I now do not use mesh shrimp traps.

I do not know the exact years that I have been going there but allowing for the closure due to drought I think that 5 years would be a fair estimate.

Allowing for holidays allow 40 weeks attendance per year.

I go there 3 times a week ,sometimes 4.

So that is 120 visits per year.

Dependent who comes with me I use between 4 and 12 pots per visit. So allow 6 as an average

.I lift my traps twice per visit.

That is 1440 per year multiplied by 5.

That equals 7200 pot movements for a total of 2 water rats.

I have never caught a turtle in a pot even though there is a large population of them in NPD.

Proves that I am a really significant threat to wildlife doesn't it?

Cheers

Ray

[faulked]

bloody murderer how can you live with yourself

[taib]

Great stats Ray.. Gotta laugh at Faulked At least when you look back, you're enjoying and loving life doing what you do best..

If i won the gold lotto, id be at NPD almost every day! ... Oh, and that house on top of the hill across the boat ramp would be yours Ray.

I hope to do the same when im retired.

Just a good thing no snakes in those bycatches... Id freak out .

cheers

ty

[rosstralia46]

mate if i were u i couldnt sleep at night :whistle: wouldnt worry ray your doing what u love and you know only catchin a few bass here and there (122 in one sesh :woohoo: ) wouldnt worry about em mate keep doing what u love which im sure you will

[ellicat]

Thanks Ray, that almost looks like a fair bit of evidence gathered over quite a while. :whistle:

I've had a turtle get into a shrimp trap (as I leave the zip partially open). Let it go though, and it toddled off to join the multi millions of it's relatives. They're hardly a rare animal and with the man-made environments there are probably more than there was before Captain Cook found the best side of the country. Around Glenlyon more probably get squashed on the road than cane toads on the coast.

[elops]

Thought I would add to this Ray as I have used funnel traps of various types to collect small native fish as well as crustaceans for 35 years in every type of freshwater and brackish water enviroment. Have no idea of how many replications but it would be many thousands.

Never had a Platypus in one despite setting them in Platypus habitat at least 50% of the time.

Never had a dead native Water Rat had a couple of live ones.

1 dead turtle, dozens of live ones, small turles are not very smart IMO.

1 dead black shag, head stuck in entrance tangled in ring tension string.

One thing though, if set overnight either set shallow with some of the trap out of the water or with floats to keep top out of the water, commonsense really.

cheers

Steve.

[Young_fella]

Ray You forgot to mention that whale that go stuck in your trap yesterday!

And all the koalas....

Boy if the greenies hear about this, NPD will be a green zone :sick:

:silly: