Shades Fishing News

Last Sunday saw a number of members of the Federal Hotel Fishing Club gather at Burrendong Dam, but not for a fishing trip as most would expect.

On this occasion the keen fishos were gathered for just the opposite reason, as it was time for the first release of fingerlings in the 2009 stocking program for the club.

With 3000 Murray Cod fingerlings received in excellent condition from our friends at Uarah Fisheries and boats at the ready, members of the Fishing Club proceeded to distribute the fingerlings at Burrendong in spots where lots of cover will give the young fish a greater chance of survival.

With a bit of luck a fair percentage will survive and grow to provide some great fishing at Burrendong in the future.

These cod are just the beginning of the restocking program carried out by the Federal Hotel Fishing Club, with a large shipment of Golden Perch fingerlings expected in February or March.

With the amount of fishing pressure being put on Burrendong at the moment, only a small minority of people coming from across the west to enjoy fishing at the dam are practicing catch and release.

I only hope that the efforts of the fishing club and fisheries department will be able to maintain stocks at the dam, to keep it’s reputation up as one of the best fisheries in the west.

The Federal Hotel Fishing Club raises its funds for this program through raffles and a joker draw held at the Federal Hotel every Thursday night.

So all those who love fishing come along and help support the club in their efforts to maintain fish stocks in the local area, as it is a very big job and we need all the community support we can get.

If our children and grandchildren are to enjoy fishing in the Wellington district as we have, then this restocking program is our best chance.

So with this program and perhaps a little education , I think the future of recreational fishing in the Wellington district is looking bright.

I know that the members of the club will keep up the hard work to carry out the program and hopefully we will enjoy many more years of great fishing at Burrendong and in the Macquarie.
Source: Wellington Times

Anglers are catching cricket scores of redfin in the local lakes. Most of the fish have been small but two anglers found a patch of larger fish at Tuggeranong and landed 30.

Murray cod and golden perch have been harder to come by, probably because redfin get to the lure first. Nevertheless a couple of nice specimens came from Burley Griffin and Gungahlin on lure and one medium-sized fish was caught in the upper Molonglo on bait.

Troll with the times

Eucumbene and Jindabyne fished well for trollers with lead core line and Tasmanian Devils and for bait anglers with bardi grubs, scrub worms and Power Bait.

Early morning, late afternoon and evening were the best times.

A man with a plan

The Chief Minister, Jon Stanhope, did a splendid job this week at Lake Ginninderra, launching the ACT Fish Stocking Plan for the next five years.

The plan outlines the Government’s intention to stock Murray cod, golden perch, silver perch and rainbow trout in local streams and lakes. The plan also offers a pleasingly long-term commitment to maintaining fish stocks for recreational and conservation purposes in all of the waterways.

The launch coincided with the release into the lake of 15,000 Murray cod fingerlings.

The next round of stockings will include Murray cod for Burley Griffin and Gungahlin, golden perch for Ginninderra, Googong, Tuggeranong and Yerrabi and silver perch and rainbow trout for Googong.

Rich pickings

The big carp and redfin competition scheduled for Lake Burley Griffin on Sunday 15 February is shaping up to be the biggest and best ever, according to organiser Jim Seears. He has announced that prize money has been increased to just over $10,000. There will also be prizes for children.

The beaut thing about this competition is that it is designed as a day of family fun that doesnt necessarily require a lot of skill. That’s because all of the prizes will be awarded for mystery weights, selected by the push of a computer button.

The person with a fish nearest to that mystery weight wins the prize. The prizes will be awarded for carp and redfin only and any native fish must be returned to the water.

To catch a carp or redfin all you need is a rod and line with a small running sinker rig and a hook full of tiger worms or scrub worms.

Tip of the week

Don’t waste any fish you catch in the Carpathon. Redfin, even small ones, are delicious to eat and carp can be frozen or salted to use as delicious bait for flathead, snapper and morwong at the coast.

Dr Bryan Pratt is a Canberra-based ecologist

Source : The Canberra Times

Thousands of small fish have been released into Lake Ginninderra as part of a restocking program for Canberra’s lakes.

More than 16,000 Murray cod fingerlings were added to the lake but it will take about five years for them to reach legal catching size.

Since the mid 1990s more than 1 million fish have been released into Canberra’s lakes.

Water ecologist Matt Beitzel says the cod also help conserve local water ways and fish breeding areas.

“By stocking the urban lakes in Lake Ginninderra and … other urban lakes … we provide the angling public a opportunity to catch fish that are stocked [locally],” he said.

“This helps relieve pressure off our wild fisheries and our most sensitive fisheries, which are out in the river systems.”

Source : ABC News

LAKE Mokoan is a shadow of its former self, with storage levels at record lows.

Drought has seen water levels in the man-made lake drop to 2.4 per cent of capacity, with just 8846 megalitres left in the 365,000-megalitre storage.

The lake will be decommissioned in the middle of the year but Lake Mokoan project director David Jeffery said that had not caused the water shortage.

“It’s entirely due to the drought conditions,” he said.

“We’ve had drought-like conditions in the Broken system for at least the past 10 years.”

The previous lowest water level on record was in February and March in 1983 when Lake Mokoan was at about 4 per cent full.

The lake has not been at capacity since June 1989.

Department of Sustainability and Environment statewide catchment and water program leader Tony Long said between 200 and 300 carp had died in the lake about two weeks ago because of the low water levels.

“There’s been some carp deaths as more isolated bodies of water dried out,” he said.

“There are isolated bodies of water separated from the main lake.

“There was a small layer of water but not enough to allow for survival.”

Mr Long said there was still two major wetlands at the lake with a water depth of between 40-50cm and there had been no fish deaths in that area.

But he said more were inevitable.

So far 107 Murray cod and 4200 golden perch have been relocated from the lake in the past year.

Mr Long said water levels were too shallow to allow any more netting of fish but more may be able to be rescued if they moved to a channel upstream of the wall and the quantity of the fish was high enough and conditions in the channel allowed work.

Mr Jeffery said construction of a $14.5 million pipeline to supply water to Lake Mokoan diverters was progressing “at a furious pace”.

The system will see diverters supplied with water from the Broken River via a pumping station and 27.5km of pipeline which will connect to a 75-megalitre storage pond.

Mr Jeffery said major concrete works on the pumping station were completed and contracts awarded for pump installation and control gear.

Diverters would receive water from the system in March.

Source : The Border Mail