Spearfishing Laws- bag limits

Just a list of recreational fishing/ spearfishing bag-limits that apply to our waters:

http://www.south-african-game-reserves.com/fish/baglimits.htm

There might be an error on that, saw billfish and dorado are unlimited ??? Is this right?

I reckon galjoen should be pushed up to 40cm. Red steenbras should be pushed up as well. A 60cm fish looks pretty juvenile still. Which of these is bank steenbras?

Just as a matter of interest, has anyone come across a seventy-four? I've seen one in all the years, maybe 25cm. It's a beautifull little fish, and by accounts the best eating fish on the coast. Pity that we won't get a chance to ever taste one. I've heard they're more plentifull as you move east. Some guys have mentioned seeing shoals of them.

Spotted Gully, Raggie? What do they taste like, and why would you take one if you're not going to eat it? I got a block of mako from a commercial once which was amazing. Just touched it on hot coals like tuna and had it rare.

I have never heard of bag limits with billfish, as they are trophy fish, and anglers generally are considerate with the amount they pull out

I came accross a mozambiquan article the other day which states that all bottom fish are illegal to catch, with fines up to R5000 (+/- 18000 mt ) each. Only game fish and pelagics

I have eaten shark while in Europe funny enough. I think over there they eat "gummy" sharks. These are the equivalent to bronzies except with no teeth. I havent had raggie though. Shark tastes horrible. It is a very soft meat. It tastes like fishy mashed-potato

I think with like any fish, the way you prepare and cook it can greatly effect the taste.

I've tasted afew. thresher, mako, pyjama, common stingray.....bleed them first..get the ammonia out. they can be very good eating if cooked properly. thing is...whenever i try cooking it, it's never as lekker as if somebody else does

think that they should up the size on red stumps also have you seen a 30cm fish it's bloody small. A 50 cm poensie still has it's infant colouring on it all the white and black stripes on it's flanks almost made a guy swim back to shore for shooting one of 53 cm the other day. His excuse was thought it was a wildeperd. ok the vis was just plain crap but still it had to be on steriods if it was a wildeperd. We can all make a difference by doing what seperates us from thje rest of the fishing hordes (selective hunting) Go for quality and not quantity. We are a few spearos down here that decided a few years ago to stop shooting any yellowbelly and poensies on the spots we dive frequently must say that it has helped quite a bit as we see yellowbellies on every outing we had in the past 4 months not huge ones yet but they are coming back steadily.

Forgot about the poensies, because we don't see them here, but you're right. It's hectic when you read some of the old fishing stories. Guys pulling out literally hundreds of fish just because they could. I read one story about a guy who brags about catching 50+ galjoen in four hours. Some of these fish were 3 - 4kg. How do you eat all of that?

On that note I have a question. I've been wondering about the fact that we tend to shoot the biggest fish we can find. This is obviously one of the reasons why we do the sport, but if we always take out the biggest of a shoal, on a reef, or in an area, are we not reducing the genetic viability of the species? Surely the reason that one fish is so much bigger than the rest, is because he has been able to outlive the others of his species in terms of feeding and staying out of the reach of predators. If we take him out, are we not weakening the gene pool of the species.

When you shoot galjoen, you rarely shoot a fish of 35 or 36cm, because you have to be sure that what you pick out in dirty water and moving at speed is going to be size. You end up with one or two fish that are usually a couple of cm over size. Every now and then you get the 50+cm fish that you're prouder of, but it tastes the same. So why not just stick to shooting medium size, or do we look at it another way and regard ourselves as part of the predators that these fish need to avoid.

I don't think this would hold true for pelagics, but in the case of something like the poensies, should we not settle on a size somewhere between "out of their pyjamas" and those big okes that scare the sh*t out of you when you see them unexpectedly? I'd like to hear another opinion on this.

I have heard that in Australia they have a minimum and a maximum size for some of the reef species. A bigger female fish will be able to produce a much greater number of eggs so it makes sense to leave the bigger fish. I have also heard stories about the way we target crayfish, by only removing the bigger bugs we are letting the ones that are genetically smaller or slower growing thrive, in the long run we could be removing the genetically superior bugs.

I heard the same thing about the crays, which was what got me to thinking about the reefies. Worth a look into I reckon.

Just out of interest sake, I took a mate of mine for his first dive about 3 years ago. We were diving smits looking for gallies and he shot a baby poensie. It was the first fish he ever shot so please forgive him, just interesting to know that they must be around here.

I have had the same chat about shooting the biggest fish out with a few good friends of mine at nationals a few years back and what I learned was do not shoot out the biggest fish as it does affect the quality of fish in the long run. Rather shoot the medium sized fish from shoals if you see them it's ok every once in a while to go out looking for that one fish as Chris Coates are so on about in his dvd. but it would not be sustainable to do that on every dive that's why I personally shot my two fish in my avatar from that mindset as the bigger one was 14,4 kg but there were two fish of about 16-17 kg right next to me. if we can implement this all the time our fisheries will improve over time, but then all of us should pull together. If there is a good couple of fish in the shoal and lots of bigger ones then by all means hit one but if there is only one or two then rather take some of the medium ones to preserve the gene pool. Anyways won't go on too heavily about this it is one thing about which I feel quite strong about.

Glad to see I'm not the only one thinking along these lines. I'll discuss this with some of the other spearos I know, and get some info from a marine biologist or two.

Hi Guys,

Nice to ee this thread. I would extend this to choosing to shoot only as much as you can eat fresh. Having said that, with Yellowtail in the Cape, I tend to shoot more than that some times. But with big fish (like Cracker, Poensies, etc.) why not just take one good fish on a dive? Respect that fish, savour it, and eat it. No need to kill two fish in a day when one of them is ten kilos or so?

Cheers,

Tony

Well, that was my next question. So often I read about the fish guys have shot, but rarely does anyone include what that fish tasted like on the braai. I don't like freezing fish, and do so only if I'm going to be keeping some for someone else. So why shoot more than you're going to eat. I know it's a sport, with comp conditions etc, and I'm not trying to take anything away from a whole lot of very good spearos out there, but as guy who shoots for the pot, I don't see the use in taking more than what my family can consume.