From May – July in 2024, we travelled to five different regions in the state – Adelaide, Mt Gambier, Pt Lincoln, Whyalla, and Renmark. The purpose was to engage with the recreational fishing community and identify areas of improvement for the state of recreational fishing in SA. These “key priorities” will build the backbone of our focus at RecFish SA.
These forums are really important to ensure as a peak body we are in touch with the community, and it allows us to work transparently as we look to address different issues.
Each region has a specific set of priorities as you will see below. Across these five forums we had 61 unique recreational fishing priorities raised which could be organised into 8 main categories. Graphics describing this information and summaries for each region are outlined below.
*Disclaimer – this information is sourced from feedback we got on our social media platforms, direct emails, calls, and crucially in-person at the forums. If your priority is not represented email your top priorities, suggestions, or feedback to ed@recfishsa.org.au. Interacting with us is the best way we can ensure we are representing your interests.
Adelaide
Adelaide is the most populous region of the forum tour and has a diverse fishery.
The community feels compliance presence is poor. Increased fisheries officer presence is desired.
The community appears to be in support of a recreational fishing licence for the purposes of funding initiatives that benefit recreational fishing through hypothecated funds.
The community appears to be against mandatory reporting of recreational catch.
Top areas of improvement are stock management and sustainable practices.
Top priorities for the community are banning longlining and netting (Gulfs & Coorong), security over access for snapper, and free launch facilities.
Top stock concern was Coorong mulloway sustainability due to commercial netting in and outside of the Coorong.
Mt Gambier
The south-east region has a diverse fishery with crayfish, tuna, and mulloway being commonly targeted species.
The community feels compliance is good. Bordering Victoria, they witness the comparatively poorer recreational fishing funded projects in SA largely related to infrastructure and fishery management. Many SE fishers have a Victorian fishing licence and as such as generally supportive of a SA fishing licence.
The community appears to be open to reporting of recreational catch but there was hesitation around making it mandatory.
Top areas of improvement are boating and infrastructure and stock management. Infrastructure at Port Mac Donnell to support barrel tuna processing (gantry, cleaning tables) is a key priority as well as attention to the Kingston ramp.
The community is concerned about the science behind the snapper management but are in general glad to have some allocation. However, the Coorong and mulloway management are the largest fisheries management concern. This is amplified due to the overlap of Glenelg River and Coorong stocks.
Port Lincoln & West Coast
The Port Lincoln and West Coast region have a strong commercial fishing presence and have a large bread-and-butter fishery. Key species targeted are snapper, KGW, flathead, and reef species.
The community feels it has good compliance and infrastructure. As such, compliance and infrastructure were not high priorities for this region, the exception being poor boat ramp payment systems on the Streaky Bay and Coffin Bay. The only compliance issue arises in the West Coast where locals feel as if possession limits of KGW are not being enforced for tourist that they feel are exploiting the resource.
The community appears to be in majority support of a recreational fishing licence for the purposes of funding initiatives that benefit recreational fishing through hypothecated funds. The community also appears to have majority support for mandatory reporting of recreational catch (~60%).
Top areas of improvement are stock management and data collection.
Top priorities were a form of recreational data collection, recreational fishing licences, a review of key species (KGW, snapper, flathead), and an opening of a freshwater fishery for the region (Tod Reservoir).
Top stock concerns were related to a lack of closed seasons for KGW, bag limits too high for flathead and bream, lack of slot limits for key species, and lack of WC snapper management as a separate stock.
Whyalla
Whyalla was once a snapper mecca and now is like Port Lincoln more of a KGW and squid fishery with some seasonal targeting of kingfish given its proximity to Point Lowly and Port Augusta.
The community feels that compliance presence should be increased and harsher penalties to be enforced for offenders.
Whyalla is not supportive of mandatory reporting, however, is supportive of a fishing licence under specific agreed outcomes and that the funds are hypothecated and managed by an independent committee.
Top areas of improvement are stock management and sustainable practices.
Top priorities were security over snapper by a large margin followed by concerns around access to squid in False Bay as they are currently lumped in with cuttlefish and access to a higher allocation of prawns recreationally.
Renmark
Renmark is dominated by its freshwater fishery with carp, callop and cod being the primary target species. The Riverland does have a decent portion of fishers that frequent the Coorong and other saltwater fisheries on occasion.
The community feels as if compliance is poor in the Riverland due to the low risk of being caught. They feel as if fisheries presence is low to absent. As such, there is a demand for more officers.
The community has overwhelming support for a fishing licence and this happened to be the most highly requested priority for the forum. 100% of the attendees are in support of a licence provided funds are hypothecated to benefiting recreational fishing projects.
All attendees were not in support of mandatory reporting but a majority would like to see an optional reporting feature added to an SA fishing app so that they can voluntarily contribute to recreational data collection.
Apart from the fishing licence, river resnagging and stocking efforts were main priorities of the community. After the recent flood event, fishing in the river has been booming and the community would like to see this continue given the evidence that through proper environmental, habitat, and stocking support is successful in achieving these outcomes.
