Survival of Barra (handling barra and other species)

[black_sheep]

Ausfishers,

With the increased number of anglers understandably taking advantage of our wonderful fishery, I thought I'd throw this post up(from Infofish). I will be trying to get this information out to as many tackle shops, caravan park kiosks and boat ramps in the near future.

Anything to try and sustain this valuable resource.


Handling barra.
http://www.info-fish.net/releasefish...Barramundi.pdf

This is the home site that gives a lot of useful information on fish survival techniques and other useful info.
http://www.info-fish.net/releasefish/default.asp

[Peter4]

Good stuff black_sheep!

[Magella]

Hey Navi
Do you know weather you can get hand outs of this as you say it would be good if tackle shops , parks etc had them

Cheers Foxie

[Whitto]

Hey Navi
Do you know weather you can get hand outs of this as you say it would be good if tackle shops , parks etc had them

Cheers Foxie

Even Photocopys of the original would be an inexpensive way to go.....certainly is straight forward and not rocket science.......Whitto

[black_sheep]

Foxy/Whitto,

I will contact Bill Sawknock from Infofish (ANSA) and see if handouts are avialable, if so, I will try and get a few addresses for him to post to including the Barra Havoc, Awoonga/Monduran kiosk etc. If not, I was just going to make a few dozen copies and distribute them myself. I need to see what options are avilable for having waterproof boxes at boat ramps where copies of this information is readily available for anglers who want to take a copy.

Thanks for the feedback.

[black_sheep]

BTW - QUEENSLANDER!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Whitto]

BTW - QUEENSLANDER!!!!!!!!!!!!!

With out a doubt, Just to stick it up Phil (Mr Magoo) Gould..........QLD ..Whitto

[nipsta]

With out a doubt, Just to stick it up Phil (Mr Magoo) Gould..........QLD ..Whitto

hey whitto well have to convert nathan before to long putting that horrible blue picture with his posts
and make sure he converted before febuary

[PNG1M]

Thanks for the info Black-sheep,

I noticed a couple of the points listed emphasised that you should support the weight of the barra (even for photos etc) and not hold the fish vertically, but there wasn't an exact reason why you should do this.

I was told on a trip or two back by a guy involved in barra farming, that barra have a particular throat clasp at the base of the underside of their lower gills. It's at the joint where the gills join together and connect to the underside upper body of the fish.

Apparently the weight of the fish itself (especially the larger ones) if held up vertically can sever this clasp or throat latch or whatever its called, causing it to collapse and the barra will later die because of it.

So even if you catch a big barra, then hold it vertically for a photo before returning it to the water...the damage may already have been done, even though you think you've done the right thing by 'catch & release.

Hence, any large barra I catch in the future I most certainly will not be holding up vertically under their own weight.

A fisho mate of mine told be a story about some large dead barra he saw floating around after some kind of a full-on barra fishing weekend (dunno where) despite the fact that the anglers were releasing the fish. He reckoned the blokes were all holding the fish up vertically for the photo shoots then the fish were returned to the water. So apparently through ignorance, these barra were being let go only to experience an uncomfortable death, due to ruptured throat latches.

I am no fish biologist and am only going on what I was told. Does anyone out there have a definate knowledge of this 'throat latch' characteristic of the barra?

From the article tips:
When photographing your fish, support its body from underneath rather than holding it vertically

Use a cradle to support the body of a fish for weighing

If using a fish grip do not hold fish vertically by the grip