Forget The Haweksbury

[Big Bob]

Went out at Patonga today.Was on the Hawkesbury by 7.30 am to be greeted by 6 Trawlers all in a row.

Can you believe this?

I didnt get a touch all day even with live Tailor and the best bait I could afford.

Forget the Hawesbury its fast becoming a Graveyard thanks to our narrow sighted Fisheries Minister and the over harvesting of this once beautiful and productive River.

Was reading Rex Hunts Fishing Australia and he stated that this was a wonderful waterway but the amount of Trawler Traffic would have to be watched.

The bastards even had the gawl to trawl past you within what I would call a reasonable distance.

There must be something that can be done to adddress this.

Any ideas and Im in.

Regards

Big Bob

ps

Freshwater Dams and rivers cater for Recreational anglers.

Maybe the quality of these fresh species doesnt constitute a good Rogering yet.

[OWZAT]

G`day fellas ,

BOB , this practice has been going on , since noah applied pitch to the ist Plank in the Ark.

I used to sit in our launch with My dad at Spencer , and watch 4/5 trawlers " Nose To Arse" daily dragging the guts out of the river , way back in the early 50`s .

Nothing has changed since then , and I doubt if it ever will.

There is simply nothing in it for Pollies at this stage mate , nothing , and I just can`t see it ever being a genuine issue for elected pollie .

If you could organise every fisherman in NSW to email the relevant minister , all you would do is shut his web site down for a few hours , unless of course you were able to do it daily , for as long as it took.

Mick

Edited March 14, 2006 by OWZAT

[outdoordan]

G`day fellas ,

BOB , this practice has been going on , since noah applied pitch to the ist Plank in the Ark.

I used to sit in our launch with My dad at Spencer , and watch 4/5 trawlers " Nose To Arse" daily dragging the guts out of the river , way back in the early 50`s .

Nothing has changed since then , and I doubt if it ever will.

There is simply nothing in it for Pollies at this stage mate , nothing , and I just can`t see it ever being a genuine issue for elected pollie .

If you could organise every fisherman in NSW to email the relevant minister , all you would do is shut his web site down for a few hours , unless of course you were able to do it daily , for as long as it took.

Mick

I'd suport that for sure.

Its time to stop raping our waterways.

Dan

[moonlitecreeper]

howdy bob dont know if you know about the fishin comp the weekend on the river but it was quiet to say at the least but more so the thought of 200 anglers tossing baits all over the spots you mentioned and no to forget the many kilos of burley thrown in as well. will have some what of a effect on the fishing for a few days it was quiet in the day but come nite it came alive as for the trawlers i know their a pain i see them all the time believe me ive had my run ins with them they wont move for you so save your breathe it will get ya no where its a sad fact for us all we love seafood so much we rape our systems inshore severly yet theirs thousands of kilometres of water outside that people think is untouched by trawlers well let me tell ya you wanna spend a nite fishing offshore its just as bad only the boats are bigger and the attitudes are even bigger ....................

[martymonsta]

I agree with you guys wholeheartedly, I mean how long can we sustain this pillaging of our natural waterways??? Maybe the only thing left for us to do in the end when there are no more wild fish stocks would be the same as they do in Vietnam with the farming of their bloody Mekong Catfish, or is that the Basa.... or Pacific Dory, as shown in the Today Tonight story about a month ago. Don't even get me started on that bloody naming convention Sorry, that's my 2 cents worth.

Not sure what can be done about the over-trawling issue.....

[kingpig]

Guys

On the news last night you would have seen a small group of pro fishermen get a lot of exposure buy attempting to stop the ferries on the Parramatta River.

A few guys got all this media attention. What do you think the Fisheries Minster would be thinking about this morning.

Rec fishermen out number pros 1000's to 1 but you never see this type of media attention ever.

I am not saying rec fishermen should break the law like these guys did. But somehow, someway we need to harness the advantage of the numbers we have and form a lobby group to push our agenda.

I will get off my soap box now.

Kingpig.

[spic]

I think we are all in agreeance that commercial fishing of our rivers is madness and we do have the numbers so how do we go about getting this issue out in the open. Surley they must be a forum where we could atleast get the general media onto it?

Time for action!!!

[Outnumbered]

i wonder how the Pro's would react to rec fisho's blocking pittwater/hawkesbury in a similar way to protest the rape of our rivers by the pro's?

[OWZAT]

Guys

On the news last night you would have seen a small group of pro fishermen get a lot of exposure buy attempting to stop the ferries on the Parramatta River.

A few guys got all this media attention. What do you think the Fisheries Minster would be thinking about this morning.

Rec fishermen out number pros 1000's to 1 but you never see this type of media attention ever.

I am not saying rec fishermen should break the law like these guys did. But somehow, someway we need to harness the advantage of the numbers we have and form a lobby group to push our agenda.

I will get off my soap box now.

Kingpig.

G`day Fellas ,

" On the news last night you would have seen a small group of pro fishermen get a lot of exposure buy attempting to stop the ferries on the Parramatta River.

A few guys got all this media attention. What do you think the Fisheries Minster would be thinking about this morning" .

Well Kingie , you may have also noticed , that the Pros were outnumbered 3 to One by the Water Police " .

This new squad , formed to protect out harbours from Terrorist attacks , finally got the chance to use their 150 million bucks woth of goodies playing tag with the Pros.

Probably a dry run for when Osamas suicide squad invades Sydney Harbour.

And What do you think the Fisheries Minster would be thinking about this morning???.

Absolutely nothing my friend , absolutely nothing .

Nothing makes politicians act , untill something becomes a direct threat to their employment .

Mick

[Gibbofisho]

imagine lino's, spearo's and bubblies all joined forces!

That's alot of people, i know for a fact that teh AUF (australian underwater federation) has numbers sufficiant to match that of the suba community. When it boils down to it, we're all after the same thing, sustainability.

[kingpig]

Mick

Your last statement is very true. The only thing a politician who is currently in power is worried about is how to get back into power at the next election.

This can be seen by the way the current state government has started to create new national parks and marine parks. This is all about getting preference from the greens in next state election and remaining in power.

If a rec fisherman lobby group could promise this groups primary vote at the next state election for a considerable reduction in commercial fishing in NSW what do you think they say then.

At the end of the day if you want change then power and pressure is the only way to get it.

We need to use the numbers we have to sway political groups the way we want things to go.

[OWZAT]

G`day Fellas ,

Hey Kingie , About 5 years ago , on another site , a fella rocked up with a plan to Unite the 5 Million Amateur fishos in Oz in a common cause to address pretty much the same problem .

Now its too long ago to remember all the details , but the basic idea was to bring all the clubs together like the AFA or AFC or whatever + others , which totaled 5 million members

After much chest beating and tree shaking , the project collapsed because of Factional infighting .

So , if the largest organisation in this country could not come together for the common good of all amateurs , what hope is there of eyeballing a pollie ?.

Mick

[go-fish]

I joined the fishing party. We need a kick ass lobby group and this one would appear to be a "formal" way of doing something.

I'm also planning on joining the Ecofishing lobbygroup when I get a moment.

[Coach]

if this post offends, then please remove it.. I am just having a "vent"

I dont understand how a few pro's can hold the pollies by the short and curlies...yet several several thousand of rec fisherpeople seem to be ignored everyday.

Whilst groups such as the fishing party, ecofishing etc etc seem all good in theory,

I (as "joe public") have never seen them REALLY ruffle a few feathers.

It seems that the charter boat guys (i.e that Pete Le Blang bloke...Sorry mate if I spelt your name wrong) seems to do more feather ruffling than all these groups seem to do together..

We all talk about action, and seem to have been talking now for 10 years?

But really..what have we done??

( I conceed we have done some good things, but really...are we only scratching the surace?)

A few pro's can huff and puff, sue the govt for damaged lifestyle etc etc, yet we...the majority...sit back, have a grumble and watch the tide go in and out.

I dunno know what the answer is, but we need some cordination on getting all groups together before its our kids that are on this forum grumbling about the same issues.

Currently we seem to be following protocol (dont get me wrong I am not implying that we break the law) and our efforts seem to be diluted and "lack lusture" at best. Perhap's we shold start takling more of an active part.

I am presuming that their are guys high up in these groups reading my rambling...

Why dont you pick up the phone and start talking to each other? get ONE spokeperson and work together for ONE goal in stead of going in different directions like a school of pillies with a hairtail going through it (Sorry had to throw at least one fishing analagy in it)

If you want to brainstorm, then lets brainstorm on "Active" things as we have proven... writing a letter does nothing!!

here's my first idea to throw into the "think tank":

We have several thousand boats going out on sydney waterways every weekend..this just seems to be too good a resourse to waste...

Maybe the first plan of attack is to organise more "on-water" protests. e.g If I knew that there was a protest drive up and down Pitwater, or broken bay etc etc at 2:00pm on every first sunday, then I would be in it every month!!!

Cummon fella's (and girls).. I am not the sharpest tool in the shed, but lets get some "action" ideas out there and see if something really cool comes up before we all have to take up knitting cause there is no fish(not that there is anything wrong with knitting...from what i hear)

Here endith my rant...

Have a good weekend all!!

[Mondo Rock]

Maybe instead of trying to get the NSW Labor government to change its stance on commercial fishing practices in NSW we should instead lobby the Liberal opposition to propose new restrictions as part of its next election platform.

If Labor isn't concerned about losing the recreational fishing vote, perhaps the Liberals will be interested in gaining it? At the very least Labor may be concerned to see a large bloc of voters being wooed to its direct opposition.

Does anyone know who the State opposition member for Fisheris is?

Mondo

[go-fish]

I went to the Fishing Party's rally a couple weeks ago. We marched on State Parliament.

The leader of the NSW state opposition - both Libs leader Peter Debnam and the Nationals state leader - among others addressed the gathering.

They have already promised to stop the proposed marine parks and review the existing rules. They seemed to want our votes pretty badly.

There is a good summary of the speakers in the Political Forum section of this site called "Friendly Rally".

[OWZAT]

Maybe instead of trying to get the NSW Labor government to change its stance on commercial fishing practices in NSW we should instead lobby the Liberal opposition to propose new restrictions as part of its next election platform.

If Labor isn't concerned about losing the recreational fishing vote, perhaps the Liberals will be interested in gaining it? At the very least Labor may be concerned to see a large bloc of voters being wooed to its direct opposition.

Does anyone know who the State opposition member for Fisheris is?

Mondo

G`day Fellas ,

As I said above , its been tried before , but when the infighting and back biting by control freaks became the norm , if all fell apart.

But if someone wants to try it again , I`ll support them to the hilt.

Mick