taking female mud crabs

[mick]

does anyone actually believe that only being allowed to keep male mud crabs is helping to maintain their population??

since i already know your answer. let me continue by saying that if this practice is so benifitual? #benefitual? beny-fish-oil? #good, then why isnt it implemented on other species of fish. surely it isnt impossible to tell a male from a female fish. prehaps instead of paying for a license, we could pay for a short course in sexing fish(not the way rex does either)and recieve a license at the end of it. #unrealisticly high fines and jail sentencing would revert the need for strong, expensive policeing. #people would be too scared of the conciquences to illegally keep fish . anyway it is just food for thought ..


mick

[Kerry]

Regardless of of one believes and without knowing the full breeding habits do crabs change sex like fish do #;D

Some species of fish are all born the one sex and change in latter life, which sort of "muddies" things up a bit #;D.

;) really officer when I caught that fish it was male #:D

Cheers, Kerry.

[imported_admin]

Mick

I think that the introduction of new size and bag limits is a step in the right direction. Can't see the female/male thing working.

What I think needs to happen, is that laws be enforced with more force and the penalties for breaking the laws be higher.

It seems that when someone is caught breaking the law they are then in front of a justice system that in some or many cases do not understand the full extent or damage the offender/s have caused or the long term damage.

Maybe we need a specific judge or number of judges that are educated more in the fishing side of things to handle these cases.

[Luke]

I actually asked a question similar to this earlier but didn't get a bite on that one so will follow up here. Do jennies get to a size and age where they stop breeding and do they regularly kill smaller bucks trying to give em one??
Cheers Luke

[Heath]

I beleive it has a detramental effect on the crab population. In NSW you can keep both Jennys & Bucks. Jennys can not be kept if they are in berry. They are also measured from front to back of the carapace not accross.

In Sydney the size of the mud crabs are huge compared with the size up here. When I first moved up here, we were throwing well legal bucks back expecting to get larger crabs.
You also catch a fairly even ratio of male to female crabs in Sydney.

Up here I have found the the size of the crabs is very small compared with sydney and the ratio of male to female to be around 1:5 and then when you take into account legal males you can reduce that ratio again.

Taking one sex will have an effect on the population as dose shaving such a large bag limit.

My suggestion is to halve the bag limit for crabs and be allowed to take both sexes as long as the female is not in berry. I think you would see an increase in numbers as well as an incease in size.

[fisho]

Bag limit down - crab numbers up ;)

[Cando]

Hi all, as I see it there is no point to changing the laws until the ones we have are ENFORCED!! The only way the laws will be enforced is by More Fishery patrols / staff not new laws. More Fishery patrols on the water not at the major boat ramps as the only people they catch their are the dumm ones. Having Laws without enough people to enforce them in right places is as good as having no laws at all. And yes, I think the size limts could go up 3cm to 10cm on most fish. I personal not eat fish so I don't take many home(only sometimes for friends). Well thats my say!!
Be good...or be good at it.... http://www.ausfish.com.au/chat/images/smilies/cwm1.gif

[mick]

as if jonny howard will fork out enough $$ for adequate fishery patrolling. increase the fines + jail sentenceing. make an example of a few people and the amount of undersize fish etc that are taken will drop.

does anyone know what the anual value for fish export is? becuase it is all a numbers game when it comes to polititions.

[saundy]

Bag and size limits on rec fishers can only slow things down a little bit when a pro can keep "anything they deem a salable size" On the crab thing I was told by a research officer once that a female will only accept being covered by a similar size male. Penalties are only effective if the offender is caught. Patrols. Recently two high profile rec fishers from this area were picked up being naughty. They successfuly had their case transfered to another area so they would not get the adverse publicity. Money talks again. Personly I think all these offences should be published in all major newspapers on a regular basis. humiliation is a great deterent. http://www.ausfish.com.au/chat/images/smilies/cwm16.gif

[Vern_Veitch]

I agree with Saundy. No use restricting recreational fishers while the commercial effort is going through the roof. I believe that Queensland continues to be the biggest harvestor of mud crabs and perhaps this has something to do with not taking jennies. I have seen large jennies breeding at Bribie Aquaculture Centre but do not know about their acceptance of smaller bucks. I have seen the opposite - big bucks covering small jennies.
I believe the answer to this is the same as in many other fisheries - we need to get the commercial effort down as while there is a dollar to be made, they will keep on working it. Perhaps some commercial free areas would be a good start. At present there are few places in Queensland where commercial crabbing is restricted.
Vern

[jaybee]

I can remember many many years ago when working at the QLD Fish Markets, there was a rail strike and i was sent into QLD Rail to pick up a consignment of live muddies heading for the sydney markets. They were packed in waxed cartons and sugar sacks. The whole consignment filled an 8 ton flat top. There were thousands of crabs. All were female and of legal size from the cairns region from 2 professionals. I beleive back then they recieved a fine of a couple o thousand..I also had the job of releasing the crabs into the river at the wharves and yes it was supervised by a fisheries inspector..just curious now..wonder what ever happened to them all after release.

[MikeC]

From what I've read it seems female crabs NEVER get too old. But no doubt many crabbers would like to use it as an excuse to keep them.
I used to work at Harbours and Marine. Siezed crabs were often released into the river there, but unfortunatley if they've been out of the water for more than approx.24 hrs they drown. The fisheries officers had no option but to release them, knowing that many if not all would die. It was sad seeing them washed up on the mud the next low tide. Lots of those crabs were from rail consignments heading south where they would be legal. What a joke! What a dumb law they have down there. And as a direct result of it our fishery suffers through greedy "professionals"
Keeping only males might not be the best answer, but it beats the hell out of keeping the bloody lot.
Mike