Deedi Response Eating tilapia and their disposal.

[Member]

After conflicting verbal answers from the Deedi telephone inquiry line I wrote to Deedi in November last year inquiring about the disposal of tilapia caught by7 boat in North pine dam. The terms of lease from SEQ water specifically prohibit the disposal of fish in the lease
 area and also prohibit the going ashore outside the lease area.
I also asked if it was permitted to fillet the fish before disposal and take the fillets home for consumption.
I asked for the response to be in writing due to the different answers I had previously.
 Hers is the answer, Cheers
 Ray
 
Hi Ray,
Sorry for the late reply, I am still trying to catch up from my end of year leave.
 
Unfortunately you are not permitted to eat tilapia or any other declared noxious fish in Queensland, including carp.  The Fisheries Act states that if any declared noxious fish are caught they are to be killed immediately and placed in a bin or buried as soon as possible.  You are not permitted to take the whole fish or any part of the fish away from the water body at all (including fillets).  The reason why we have this rule is we still only have tilapia in 17 of our 76 catchments in Queensland.  If we allowed people to utilise noxious fish we would see individuals illegally stocking their farm dams and releasing noxious fish in their local waterways for their own use, as is the case with red claw crayfish.  It is illegal to move these fish around, you are not to have them in your possession at all (including parts of the fish) other than the short amount of time it takes to kill them and dispose of them at the site.  It is also illegal to release them back into the water.  The maximum penalty for the possession of noxious fish (including parts of the fish like fillets) is $200,000.
 
Seqwater have informed me they have disposal bins for tilapia at North Pine Dam.  They may not be exactly where you are fishing however and therefore you would be permitted to have these fish in your possession until you reached the disposal facilities.
 
I hope this information has been helpful, please do not hesitate to contact me if you require any further information.
 
Regards,

 ( Name deleted by Ray)
                                       ><@'>
Fisheries Biologist (Pest Fish)   

Deedi did not comment on the fact that imported fillets are on sale.
 Now all I have to do is find out where the seq waters disposal points are.
 Cheers
 Ray

[Member]

Good work Ray
Thanks for putting the time in to clarify this.

Regards
Adrian

[Member]

Disposal points are next to the BBQ's Ray 

[Member]

So did you learn anything new for your efforts Ray? 

Thanks for sharing, many probably haven't heard/read it before so good info.

That's pretty much the stock standard answer I would have expected. $200 or $200 000...... I don't see a fine or threat of one, being the barrier to tilapia turning up in other waterways unfortunately.

Redclaw Vs Tilapia.........     its worth noting that redclaw have been available, LIVE, via every produce/pet/aquarium store across the country as feeders for many years so have been readily available for fishing as live bait. Tilapia are not available at the corner store. I would be looking towards aquaculture industry, in the first instance, on the meotoric spread of redclaw.

Tilapia & its 100+ relatives in Australia are here wholey & soley from & for the ornamental fish trade, then via hobby, back yard breeder, yet most are still here with the blessing of our various govt departments, while many of these fish without a doubt have the ability to turn wild & be another tilapia; yet where's the fine for these?  Nada!!! Here is where fines for possesion would have the greatest results, not after the horse has bolted.

Can I now be permitted to draw a comparison between 100+ cihclids & redclaw in that you can buy the bloody things from the local supermarket just about.......

[Member]

So did you learn anything new for your efforts Ray? 
Just illustrates the problems with the Deedi inquiry line. To my mind it must be staffed in a call centre who are given a set of stock answers for most inquiries.
 The problem arises when they get a question that they cant find an answer for.
Some of them do the right thing and pass it up the line or maybe if they have a lot of calls waiting they improvise which has happened to me on several occasions.Sometimes they get it right and other times hopelessly wrong ( EG when i posed the question re keeping tilapia fillets one no and one yes)

 I now ask for all answers to be made in writing .
At least I then have my bum covered.
Cheers
Ray

[Member]

Good one Ray. 

With the lack of funding to run the Deedi and Fisheries they would have to look on our ' Take Rate ' as the best form of control available.

As well as being easy to catch look at the flavor. 

If they were like the Carp, bony and tasteless, they would take over the impoundments, push aside the native species and we would all be looking for somewhere to fish.

Fishing in your favourite dam would just be a memory.  Local camp grounds and tackle shops would suffer.  They would be getting a lot more mail at Deedi and still no funding to do anything about it.

Regards Gordon

[Member]

Isn't it great how they intend to stop lawbreakers from spreading tilapia by having a law that says you can't eat them. Of course, the lawbreakers aren't going to disobey that law!

[Member]

Good one Ray. 

With the lack of funding to run the Deedi and Fisheries they would have to look on our ' Take Rate ' as the best form of control available.

Regards Gordon

Currently the best form of tilapia control bar none, or rather keeping densitities lower is from native predator fish. Their numbers are shown to be far fewer where there are high numbers of native predator fish present, namely stocked lakes. Predation is not a "cure all" but is one form of control that in conjunction with others like recreational & commercial harvest, biological etc may one day see tilpia eradicated from our waterways.

Cheers,

fitz..

[Member]

The greatest mechanism for the spread of Tilapia has been the recent floods, post flood there would be Tilapia in EVERY stream that connects to the sea from the Nerang to the Sunshine coast. Flushed from countless refugiums in SEQ they are now everywhere, came across some in some coastal swamp habitat a couple of weeks ago that has a population of Psuedomugil mellis and Nannoperca oxleyana . As Fitz said, the first of countless species of Cichlid which are turning up everywhere in QLD Brasiliensis the next one that we will see, a half a dozen other contenders for third place. A walk around Forest Lake is an eye opener, brood pits everywhere in the shallow edge that have been dug and cleared of macrophytes. Most with an attendant male Tilapia a couple with male Redhead cichlids and several smaller species.
Go for a walk with rod and worms or hop blade or work suspending lures past them in the afternoons. Best catch so far a 35cm Red Devil, the resident Spangled Perch do their best patroling the brood pits but a few survive and the cycle continues. 

[Member]

Another form of predation you could look into Fitzy, you have all the contacts.

Ask some of the northern clubs whether the Tilapia thrive in areas where the Johnson River Croc swim.

They would make Somerset an exciting place to fish if we released a few thousand down here.

Gordon

[Member]

Currently the best form of tilapia control bar none, or rather keeping densitities lower is from native predator fish. Their numbers are shown to be far fewer where there are high numbers of native predator fish present, namely stocked lakes. Predation is not a "cure all" but is one form of control that in conjunction with others like recreational & commercial harvest, biological etc may one day see tilpia eradicated from our waterways.

Cheers,

fitz..

I'm sure that is true, but Lake Tinaroo certainly has a large and growing population of Tilapia.  They just breed too fast for the barra to keep up with.

[Member]

After conflicting verbal answers from the Deedi telephone inquiry line I wrote to Deedi in November last year inquiring about the disposal of tilapia caught by7 boat in North pine dam. The terms of lease from SEQ water specifically prohibit the disposal of fish in the lease
 area and also prohibit the going ashore outside the lease area.
I also asked if it was permitted to fillet the fish before disposal and take the fillets home for consumption.
I asked for the response to be in writing due to the different answers I had previously.
 Hers is the answer, Cheers
 Ray
 
Hi Ray,
Sorry for the late reply, I am still trying to catch up from my end of year leave.
 
Unfortunately you are not permitted to eat tilapia or any other declared noxious fish in Queensland, including carp.  The Fisheries Act states that if any declared noxious fish are caught they are to be killed immediately and placed in a bin or buried as soon as possible.  You are not permitted to take the whole fish or any part of the fish away from the water body at all (including fillets).  The reason why we have this rule is we still only have tilapia in 17 of our 76 catchments in Queensland.  If we allowed people to utilise noxious fish we would see individuals illegally stocking their farm dams and releasing noxious fish in their local waterways for their own use, as is the case with red claw crayfish.  It is illegal to move these fish around, you are not to have them in your possession at all (including parts of the fish) other than the short amount of time it takes to kill them and dispose of them at the site.  It is also illegal to release them back into the water.  The maximum penalty for the possession of noxious fish (including parts of the fish like fillets) is $200,000.
 
Seqwater have informed me they have disposal bins for tilapia at North Pine Dam.  They may not be exactly where you are fishing however and therefore you would be permitted to have these fish in your possession until you reached the disposal facilities.
 
I hope this information has been helpful, please do not hesitate to contact me if you require any further information.
 
Regards,

 ( Name deleted by Ray)
                                       ><@'>
Fisheries Biologist (Pest Fish)   

Deedi did not comment on the fact that imported fillets are on sale.
 Now all I have to do is find out where the seq waters disposal points are.
 Cheers
 Ray

So are these fish any good to eat ? i gather they must be ok as one can purchase fillets from a a fish monger .

The laws covering pest fish in QLD are plainly ridiculous , their reasons are so flawed it's not funny , from that reply you guys need some major changes .

In NSW it's open slather on pest species to help control numbers , 

Cheers Pete

[Member]

Half the problem with these pest fish is that dickhead fish keepers go " oh wouldnt it be awesome if these where down the river or in that dam" You honestly wouldnt credit how many people i have heard say that .. FACKING D%$KWADS ........ it usually ends up in me telling them where to go and how stupid they are and have no idea what the implications of what the want to do are.

If you cant cut the head off the snake by banning the live fish aquarium trade into australia im affriad the horse has bolted as there will forever be just that 1 tool to stuff it up for everyone.

I realise this is an extreme impossability  but i see no alternative. Just wait and see when snakeheads get into our waterways we will really be boned then.

Apparrently i woke up grumpy ...

Steve

[Member]

Half the problem with these pest fish is that dickhead fish keepers go " oh wouldnt it be awesome if these where down the river or in that dam" You honestly wouldnt credit how many people i have heard say that .. FACKING D%$KWADS ........ it usually ends up in me telling them where to go and how stupid they are and have no idea what the implications of what the want to do are.

If you cant cut the head off the snake by banning the live fish aquarium trade into australia im affriad the horse has bolted as there will forever be just that 1 tool to stuff it up for everyone.

I realise this is an extreme impossability  but i see no alternative. Just wait and see when snakeheads get into our waterways we will really be boned then.

Apparrently i woke up grumpy ...

Steve

That may well be fine but it's no answer to control a feral fish population  ,it's all been done with carp this way ,  if people move fish about from one waterway to another,  very little can be done to stop them , then you have a  flood crisis , like now ,it's all over , no doubt those fish will turn up in areas not known before ,  fish fillets are of no interest to me nor would  i be interested in running around looking for bins that are either provided / or bins that don't exist .
Classic example is Asian carp in the States , heaps has been done to prevent them from entering the great lakes system ,  it has failed

Cheers Pete

[Member]

There's one big thing that tells me they're not taking this all that seriously: the lack of signage.  Having been to three out of the four main land-based fishing spots around NPD lately, I carefully checked out the signs they had there.  I saw signs covering the need for a permit, signs about blue-green algae, signs about fire danger, signs about what you could and couldn't do there... but no signs about tilapia.

If they were serious, there'd be signs at each spot with, at the very least, pictures of juvenile and adult tilapia, text in English and Chinese (and probably a few other common local languages), and bins set aside specifically for tilapia disposal.  They'd also have warnings clearly posted on the stocked impoundment permit website, and a flyer to go with each new rod sold at local tackle stores.  As it is, it's completely possible to buy a permit, buy tackle, and go fishing at the legal shore access sites, all without ever seeing anything whatsoever about tilapia (or redclaws, for that matter).  The only way the average punter at the dam hears about it is through word of mouth.