Moving Fish

J

JacquesB82

New member
Hi i have a question to all the clever guys here. We have a dam here at our mine that may or may not be shut down after 2020. There may be a chance that the mine will reopen and then the dam will not be shut down, but so far it will shut down and the dam will have to be converted into farm land.

This dam has been closed for fishing for quite a while +-7yrs and then opened for a while +-1yrs, and now closed again. Now word is there are huge carp in there, i went for a few hours convensional fishing to keep the kids intertained. I cought fish between 3 and 5 kg all day, but suspect that the dam is totally over populated with fish. The storys of the older guys around the area is that there are masive carp in there, although the largest one i saw was about 12kg about 15 years ago and i know that fish was released.

Now wether the dam has big fish or the over population of fish has had a huge effect i cant say, but i have a feeling that there may well be 30+ lbers in there somewhere. The dam has never run dry water pumped from mine workings underground, but is now threatening to do just that, or become a wet land. Apparently, as i have been told if it becomes overgrown with reed it becomes a wetland. I don't know.

How would we go about moving the fish?
Is there legals?
Any other ideas or info will be appreciated.
 
A

axle

Member
Hi Jacques

Moving and transporting live carp, bass, trout (basically all the so-called "invasive" species) is illegal. You need a permit to be able to do so and I can almost guarantee you won't get one to relocate them. As a matter of fact, one is actually meant to even remove them if you catch them (ie not catch and release), but of course that isn't our mindset in this country and most people catch and release, which if course there is nothing wrong with that. It's our dumb ass government that haven't yet realised those so-called invasive species have been in our waters for hundreds of years and are not gonna be "eradicated" by our sport fishing population. The only thing I can suggest is that they manage the dam properly. Remove some of the reeds, remove some of the smaller carp population and give it as food to the local community and perhaps introduce some kurper species to control the carp population (they eat their eggs). Carp are prolific breeders and can lay up to 50 000 eggs per kilogram of weight.

Just a note ... in my first statement I mention that those species may not be MOVED or RELOCATED ALIVE, hence why I suggest catching them and giving them to the local community.
 
J

JacquesB82

New member
O no the dam will be closed off, shut-down and filled with soil. in other words the fish will DIE. that is why i am asking.

I for one will not let 30lb plus fish to die even if i move them elegally to another dam close by, and i am not the only one thinking that way around here.

I dont see the benefit of dead monster carp, they should have some way of being able to legally move the carp to a decent venue that is looking for some large carp.

One of the blokes here is saying that his brother cought a 40lb 21kg-22kg carp at the dam and that it was released in around 2005. if that is the case and true, then we have fish here that we dont want to die.

This dam has some good fishing stories, and listening to the locals here is interesting. All these big carp have been caught on convensional method. Only one person i know did specimen angling here and he managed to haul in 20 carp in an overnight session, and not one under 5kg largest being just under 9kg. as i said the dam is overpopulated with carp, all these carp were a bit skinny and not getting enough food. imagine these fish in prime condition.
 
A

axle

Member
As mentioned, it is illegal to move or relocate carp alive. Another reason is disease. If one or more of the fish do have a disease, they could infect the whole population of another dam.

But I hear you with regards to wanting to "save" the larger fish - I would want to do the same. You would most likely have to do it illegally. I'll chat to a few people and see if there is perhaps a legal way of doing it.
 
J

JacquesB82

New member
That would be great, but i understand the problems with desease and so forth, so ya it is a problem.

I dont mind loosing fish, but if we are talking about 40lb fish then it becomes a sad story. (if they are there, its posable)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top