Early Season Streamer Tactics — Lubin Pfeiffer

JO PALMER is our marine and freshwater fisheries Minister and just in that space there is plenty to do - let alone the rest of her departmental responsibilities. One area I have of huge concern is calamari. It is a diminishing resource. Calamari management is a challenge. It is commercially heavily fished in the north of the state - and there is currently no constraint on commercial catch. Recs have bag and possession limits.

It is quite likely the fisheries department and Minister will do nothing this year to address the overfishing - especially during spawning.

At the moment the only things saving massive explotation of spawning aggregation is a one month closed season for both the commercial and recreational sector, but spawning times vary and the best time is just a guesstimate of October. I think the closed season should be extended at least two weeks either side of the current arrangements.

This issue is ongoing, and whilst there is a planned commercial licence arrangement to be introduced for the north of the state - that will not happen this year. Undoubtedly the Northern zone will get very heavily fish again, again with no constraint outside a seasonal closure. Managers and scientists know this area is overfished and depleting, but are doing too little too late. This has been too common in Tasmania. You can check out some calamari documents here: https://tasfish.com/160-peak-bodies/2910-calamarimanagement-documents

Trout season

It always interests me that people have their favourite water. We are all creatures of habit. Often they fish the same lake, lagoon or river constantly, with little variation. I try not to, (apart from my local Four Springs), but not doing that makes it difficult to learn the vagaries of waters.If you want to get good at catching fish in those waters I suppose constant visits are a must.

I have about 20 or 30 favourite places and some days I fish 5 or 6 streams until I find one that is firing. But, to me, that is the attraction of small streams. I love them.

Last year on opening day I fished a very small stream with a mate where you could have a foot on each bank without getting wet. I think I caught five fish on dry flies and he was similar. Is was a lot of fun and I think that will be my plan again this year - find a little streamand some happy trout.

That said, I do like Four Springs Lagoon and usually go there at 6.30am on opening day to do my ABC Radio broadcast. I don’t fish there opening day.

It is only 30 minutes drive from home and usually the weather is similar, so if conditions are good in Launceston, they will be similar there. It has been an extraordinarily popular water and as it is at a low