Fish bites: Car, jet ski, dive gear seized from repeat offender
More water for the Murray; boat party gets punchy; Queensland lakes cut off from boatersA repeat offender caught at Ulladulla on the NSW south coast with way more abalone and rock lobster than recreational fishing rules permit has had his car, trailer and jet ski all seized by fisheries officers.
According to the NSW DPI Fisheries, officers were on a routine patrol checking licences and fish when they saw a man that was known to them diving off a jet ski.
Officers will allege he was found with 94 abalones and six eastern rock lobster – both each have a bag or combined limit of just two.
According to the NSW DPI, the man will now be prosecuted.
Murray to get increased water flow
The Murray-Darling Basin Authority has announced it will start to increase the amount of water flowing out of the Hume Dam in an effort to minimise the risk of flood damage downstream.
According to the authority, at 88 per cent capacity the storage level at Hume Dam was high, demand had dropped, and the region was heading into a period of peak inflows.
"Rain falling in the upper Murray this week means there is a chance that we will increase releases further, depending on how much water flows into the dam,” the authority said.
“Catchments have dried out over autumn so it would take heavy rain or back-to-back events to wet them up again.
"Overbank flows in the Murray River downstream of Hume Dam require flows of 25,000 megalitres per day, and though we are still a long way from seeing that volume of water in the river, conditions can change quickly.”
Downstream of the Hume Dam, Lake Mulwala is being lowered by around 5.0 metres to help control a water weed infestation.
Florida boat party ends with fight
A huge fight that broke out at a floating soundstage in Lake George, Florida, has been caught on police cameras.
Police say they made several arrests and issued a number of warnings after a group of men started hooking into each other.
Reports said later that 12 men were arrested, while a number of boaters were also issued infringement notices for drink-driving.
The boats were gathered at the shallow lake for a “Mayhem at Lake George 2022” party.
Queensland lake closures roll out
Seqwater has announced the closure of a number of lakes it manages as heavy rain continues to fall across southern Queensland.
The closures affect recreational boating and include:
- Lake Baroon - closed to all water-based activities
- Lake Borumba - closed to water skiing, jet skiing
- Lake Kurwongbah - closed to water skiing
- Ewen Maddock - closed to swimming, all trails closed
- Gold Creek - closed to all recreation
- Lake Macdonald - closed to boating and paddlecraft
- Lake Manchester - closed to all recreation
- Lake Somerset - closed to swimming, water skiing and jet skiing
- Lake Wyaralong - all trails are closed
No mention was made of when these waters are expected to re-open to recreational boating.
Berkley updates PowerBait range for 2022
Soft plastics specialist Berkley has tweaked its line-up to introduce new shapes, sizes and colours in across some of its more popular PowerBait lures.
New shapes include a fantail shrimp, craw, and a forktail minnow, while grub, nemesis and nemesis paddle tail soft plastics introduce new colours including Camo, Cappuccino, Blue Shiner Gold and Watermelon Pearl.
Berkley said the new-look soft plastics were in-store now.
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