5 tips to beat the ever-watching taxman

While it’s more common to lose fish to sharks in warmer tropical and sub-tropical seas, most serious anglers who drop a line regularly in the salt, even down south, have encountered this problem.

Many of us have lost a prized catch or three to the ocean’s “tax collectors”, as they’re colloquially known.

Some areas are particularly notorious these days for their fish-stealing shark packs: few more so than Hervey Bay, in southeastern Queensland.

However, as far afield as Cape York, the Top End, Exmouth and even the South Australian gulfs, stories of shark depredation are increasing exponentially over time.

There are no doubt many reasons for this unsettling trend. Increasing fishing pressure, reduced supplies of the sharks’ regular food sources, as well as warming waters in many regions all play a part.

So too do increases in the populations of some shark species (particularly the whalers and certain reef sharks), mostly due to decreased commercial exploitation of their stocks.

It’s ironic that while some shark species are in serious decline and need more protection, others are multiplying to fill the gaps left in the predator pyramid.

The bottom line is that many of these more abundant shark varieties have keyed into human activities and become increasingly reliant on the easy “hand-outs” of protein presented by human fishing activities: both recreational and commercial.

Sharks nowadays clearly recognise (and aggregate towards) more heavily fished areas, and have also “learnt” to follow boats, and even to recognise changes in engine revs and other indicators of a hook-up or a net being hauled.

Loss of hooked or freshly-released fish to sharks is not only heartbreaking for anglers, it also presents a growing challenge to fisheries managers.

Shark depredation is now a significant cause of mortality in many fisheries, yet it’s not one that’s easily measured, controlled, or even factored into quotas and other catch limits.

This is clearly a problem.

As anglers, we all need to do our bit to reduce these negative interactions with predatory sharks. Here are five steps you can take to help curb the ocean’s tax collectors:

As far as possible, reduce fight times on all hooked fish by selecting line classes and matching equipment (rods and reels) that are suited to the size and strength of your target species.

The less time a fish spends struggling on the end of your line, the less chance it will be “sharked”!

Minimise berleying, and if you do berley, use small cut pieces or chunks rather than minced fish flesh.

Think about everything else that goes into the water from your boat, too. If you’re bleeding fish, do it in a container or tub and don’t pour the bloody water overboard until you’re heading for home.

Sometimes if a hooked pelagic fish such as a tuna, mackerel or queenfish is being pursued by sharks, free-spooling the reel may allow it to outrun its tormentors, but be careful to avoid backlashes!

Obviously, you’ll eventually need to ease the pressure back on again and try to land the fish, but occasionally this brief respite will do the trick… It’s definitely worth trying!

Catch and release is a great thing, and very applicable in some fisheries, but letting go an exhausted, bleeding or injured fish may be counter-productive.

Consider keeping any fish with low survival prospects, and always try to give any released fish the best possible chance of escape.

In tropical estuaries, this may mean quickly motoring to the bank so the released fish can seek shelter in snags or mangroves.

If you’re losing almost every fish you hook to sharks in a particular location, stop fishing and move.

Continuing to feed the “taxman” simply reinforces their human-reliant predatory behaviour, and makes things even harder for the next boat that visits that spot.

Depredation of hooked and recently released fish by sharks and other predators (including seals in our southern seas) is a problem that’s not going to disappear, but we can all do our best to limit it by following these five simple steps.

Steve ‘Starlo’ Starling is one of Australia’s best-known and most respected fishing communicators.

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