G at Australian Seachange Newsletter - Southern Freedivers

guns, fish traps, beach seine nets, and gill nets to aid coral reefs that have been hit with
bleaching.
The team's research, carried out in Kenya and Papua New Guinea, showed certain types of
gear was more damaging to corals and to certain species of fish needed to help reefs
recover from bleaching or storm damage.
Dr Cinner, who is based at James Cook University, said the fishing gear was creating a
double jeopardy for both the corals and certain types of reef fish.
"They are already on the edge because of the overfishing and the additional impact caused
by a bleaching even can push them over," he said.
The team found spear guns were the most damaging of all fishing gear, especially to corals
themselves and fish such as parrot and trigger fish, which keep seaweeds and urchins in
check while coral regrows.
"Spear guns target a high proportion of species that help maintain the resilience of coral
reefs, but also can result in a surprising amount of damage to the corals themselves," Dr
Cinner said.
"When a fish is shot with a spear gun, it often hides in the reef, so some fishermen break the
corals in their attempts to get it."
Dr Cinner said temporary bans or imposing permanent restrictions on the use of various
types of gear could apply to virtually any coral reef management whether in the developing
world or in developed countries such as on Australia's Great Barrier Reef.
Fellow JCU fisheries scientist Dr Andrew Tobin said the proposed fishing gear bans should
not be applicable to the Great Barrier Reef.
"Some of those findings are probably very reasonable for those areas they've studied, but to
make any link to Great Barrier Reef waters is probably drawing a very long sword," Dr Tobin
said.
"The fishing gears he's looking at, most of them aren't used in the GBR World Heritage Area
anyway."
Dr Tobin said there was very little spearfishing on the reef.
"There's already some pretty harsh regulations in place for that, he said.
"It's a reasonably low fishing method, as well."
Townsville marine biologist Dr Walter Starck, who provides advice to Sunfish North
Queensland, said there was no issue with overfishing of herbivorous fish on the Great
Barrier Reef. "Here in Australia, it is completely irrelevant," he said.
Sunfish North Queensland spokesman Brian Pickup labelled the study's scientists as 'doom
and gloom merchants'.
"All right, we might have a problem with netting, but we don't have a problem with
sustainability of our fisheries on the Great Barrier Reef," Mr Pickup said.
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