Do You Care About Fishing?

If you haven’t already heard, the NSW Government have put forth a proposal for 25 marine conservation sites along our coast between Newcastle and Wollongong.

To get a general idea of the whole situation you can see the following PDF which maps out each proposed location and what type of ‘zone’ it will be: https://www.marine.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/821246/Hawkesbury-Bioregion-marine-park-proposal-site-map.pdf

For a more in-depth look at what it’s all about, click the image above or the following link: https://www.marine.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0018/821304/Hawkesbury-Shelf-Marine-Bioregion-Discusion-Paper-2-site-proposals.pdf

Basically, the government are creating zones that disallow us to recreational fish and/or spearfish. Here’s what each zone means without the fluff:

Sanctuary Zones (pink) – no fishing or spearfishing allowed

Conservation Zones (green) – no fishing or spearfishing allowed. Two big ones that will effect us here are the Royal National Park one (which disallows fishing off the rocks or in close between Martin Head and Garie Beach) and the Bronte-Coogee one (which disallows fishing from the shore all the way out to 3 nautical miles past the 50m depth contour).

Special purpose zones (blue) – the rules in these zones vary depending on the location so I recommend looking up the area that would effect you and finding the chart that says what you can and can’t do, which will be located at the bottom of that locations section.

Intertidal Protected Areas (IPAs) – these are marked in yellow on the left of the map, but are blue for the actual areas they effect. These zones cover the shorelines between the average water mark for high tide and 10m past the average water mark for low tide. The IPAs don’t hinder fishing or spearfishing ability, what they do is stop any bait from being collected from here e.g. pipis, nippers, cunjevoi etc. Sydney Harbour cops the biggest hit here, the entire waterway’s shoreline will be classed as an IPA.

Many of these proposed marine conservation sites effect our ability as fishers and spearfishers to do what we love, so please have your say by submitting your thoughts on the plans before 27th September either via the online form here or by sending a letter addressed to:
Submission — Enhancing conservation of marine biodiversity in the Hawkesbury Shelf marine bioregion – Discussion paper
NSW Marine Estate Management Authority
Locked Bag 1
Nelson Bay NSW 2315

Also there’s a Facebook group called STOP THE LOCKOUT! that you can join. Head to the ‘About’ section in the group and complete the short online survey that’s linked. Every submission will count!