It is official you are not allowed to eat tilapia in qld.

[rayken1938]

After conflicting verbal answers from the Deedi telephone inquiry line I wrote to Deedi in November last year inquiring about the disposal of tilapia caught by7 boat in North pine dam. The terms of lease from SEQ water specifically prohibit the disposal of fish in the lease
area and also prohibit the going ashore outside the lease area.
I also asked if it was permitted to fillet the fish before disposal and take the fillets home for consumption.
I asked for the response to be in writing due to the different answers I had previously.
Hers is the answer, Cheers
Ray

Hi Ray,
Sorry for the late reply, I am still trying to catch up from my end of year leave.

Unfortunately you are not permitted to eat tilapia or any other declared noxious fish in Queensland, including carp. The Fisheries Act states that if any declared noxious fish are caught they are to be killed immediately and placed in a bin or buried as soon as possible. You are not permitted to take the whole fish or any part of the fish away from the water body at all (including fillets). The reason why we have this rule is we still only have tilapia in 17 of our 76 catchments in Queensland. If we allowed people to utilise noxious fish we would see individuals illegally stocking their farm dams and releasing noxious fish in their local waterways for their own use, as is the case with red claw crayfish. It is illegal to move these fish around, you are not to have them in your possession at all (including parts of the fish) other than the short amount of time it takes to kill them and dispose of them at the site. It is also illegal to release them back into the water. The maximum penalty for the possession of noxious fish (including parts of the fish like fillets) is $200,000.

Seqwater have informed me they have disposal bins for tilapia at North Pine Dam. They may not be exactly where you are fishing however and therefore you would be permitted to have these fish in your possession until you reached the disposal facilities.

I hope this information has been helpful, please do not hesitate to contact me if you require any further information.

Regards,


><@'>
Fisheries Biologist (Pest Fish)

I wondernhow you would get non with the imported fillets for nsale.

[MudRiverDan]

Why are the illegal to eat?
might help keep the population down.

They would be better of promoting the illegality of keeping small jew in the Brisbane river.

Seen a guy with a bucket of them a few months back.

[Triple]

They are not allowed to sell or import whole fish or fillets unless with a permit and selling to another permit holder. If fish shops are selling mozambique tilapia to the public then it will be any easy money maker for the dpi to pay them a visit.

[Triple]

Why are the illegal to eat?
might help keep the population down.

They would be better of promoting the illegality of keeping small jew in the Brisbane river.

Seen a guy with a bucket of them a few months back.

Posted this the other day in another thread -

"Re: Hilliards Creek Today
Had a long chat with fisheries officer regarding tilapia today, lovely lady called Dani. Clarified that possession is "any part of the fish" whole fish/frame/eye/skin/fillets etc. You may only have a noxious species in possession awaiting disposal , example: Caught from a boat, knocked on the head and waiting to return to shore for burial or bin (she stated that if it is on ice in an esky it may have the officers asking more questions so it's better to chuck em in a bucket in the sun).

She agreed that they are here to stay as they are now in 17 of qld's 76 waterways (first found in the 1970's) and they know they cannot get rid of them (unless poisoning the whole waterway) but can only try to stop them spreading and due to their limited budget they are relying on public knowledge and awareness (and a bit of common sense). Blanket rule for NO possession is the only way to do this as once their is a price on them (ie:fillets, personal consumption or otherwise) people will place them in their own dams or local creeks and it will increase chance of spreading. Northern QLD has tried using bass/barra but it only slows the breeding cycle down."

Has been noted that fishing pressure will hardly even dent the population of established Tilapia affected areas.

Time for a "Show us your P.B Tilapia thread" I think, to encourage a few blokes to hit em hard anyway and get the young kids out to wet a line (easy to catch and are in most local creeks/ponds/dams).

[rayken1938]

A couple of years ago they had to poison a whole river system flowing into the gulf to get rid of a population of tilapia that had become established. Apparently they would have had a disastrous effect on the barra fishery.
I think it may have been the gunpowder river.
Cheers
Ray

[stonecold]

Thanks Ray, cleared the subject up nicely. Dan..why cant we eat em?...lets look an situation. Rabbits were initially introduced to give our earlier settlers something to hunt and eat?...Look what happened there. I'm pretty sure no Ausfishers would participate in the proliferatin of a noxious fish because,
A. there was heaps of em and they were dead easy to catch, and
B. they made a feed

But, Im sure you would agree that there are those in the general population that would.

[finga]

So by reading that there is nothing stopping you from eating them at the body of water??
ie catch, kill, slap on a BBQ plate while the frame is thrown in the bin.

Are there specialised bins to place noxious fish into??
I'm thinking of crows and the like getting fish out of the ordinary garbage bins with no lids.

[Camhawk88]

Why are the illegal to eat?
might help keep the population down.

.

That is clearly explained in the response-you might want to read it again.

[Gazza]

So by reading that there is nothing stopping you from eating them at the body of water??
ie catch, kill, slap on a BBQ plate while the frame is thrown in the bin.

Are there specialised bins to place noxious fish into??
I'm thinking of crows and the like getting fish out of the ordinary garbage bins with no lids.Totally agree Finga , having "Fillets without frame" ...can IN NO WAY spread a noxious fish.
(I do understand they can possibly carry babies in their mouths , I think?)

$200,000 fine , tell 'em they're dreaming :o

[Luc]

DEEDI is fighting a reargard action to try & delay the spread. Unfortunately, it's not going to stop certain people from translocating them.

As for the fine, first you need to actually have inspectors out there!!

They can't even police known problem areas like Mt Crosby Weir.

Luc

[rayken1938]

Could change in time I think that in NSW you are now allowed to keep carp. I saw a proposal for this to be implemented a couple of years ago.
Cheers
Ray

[onerabbit]

Very interesting that this also applies to red claw crays,
I know ppl who go ouit of their way to catch them in numbers (at Sommerset Dam) & take them home to NSW to eat,
wait till I tell them they are acting illegally.

Muzz

[rayken1938]

It is legal to catch,take home and eat redclaw.
It is only illegal to translocate them
It is illegal to use live redclaw for bait but ok to use dead redclaw or redclaw flesh for bait.
Redlcaw flesh is great tilapia bait.
Cheers
Ray

[onerabbit]

If we allowed people to utilise noxious fish we would see individuals illegally stocking their farm dams and releasing noxious fish in their local waterways for their own use, as is the case with red claw crayfish.

Fair go, guess I just read it the wrong way.

Muzz