Fishing Victoria Forum

If only there was a bit more green tape to either stop this from happening in the first place or royally fist companies who don’t pay proper compensation.

Given the federal government is in the pocket of fossil fuel businesses I’m not convinced there’s going to be much done about it from a federal level.

Yep, it's criminal. They were told there would be no effect on the fishing. Well a 99.5% reduction in catch rate is far from having no impact!

cmon 99.5% isn't that much haha

Wow 99.5% reduction really?
It says over 6 months, maybe need more data of longer period of time to get it more accurate.

Sebb wrote: ↑

Thu Aug 06, 2020 9:38 am

Wow 99.5% reduction really?
It says over 6 months, maybe need more data of longer period of time to get it more accurate.

The longer term studies might show if the fish simply moved (and might move back once the disturbance is over) or if they were killed, in which case recovery could take much longer.

The fish constantly move. You can work a patch for a while then they move on. You can go to an area one week and there is nothing. A week later it is going off. There is a season pattern to the fish, but exactly where they are changes day to day. In reality there are far more places without fish than with fish. There is also huge year to year fluctuations. I would treat all the claims in this dispute with a grain of salt. The only thing that is certain is that oil and gas exploration does impinge on commercial fishing in many ways. Trying to quantify the $ effect is very difficult due to the random chaos of the natural world

I agree with there needing to be more long-term data, six months is too short to determine if it's the seismic activity vs things like seasonal variation, population movements or changes in the natural structures (reef, weed, etc).

I'd love to see more studies on those easily spooked species like KGW, I wonder how long-term seismic activity affects their behaviour seeing as they head off shore to breed.