00:00There's a flat feeling on the way for fishers.
00:06Catching sand flathead in the south east of the state will be banned from March 1.
00:11It's a decision that's been made on science.
00:14It's been made on the future strategic viability of our fishery.
00:19The south east fishery extends from whale head to Cape Pillar.
00:23Just 5% of stock remains in that area and those fish aren't big.
00:29In the south east approximately 1 in 100 fish are of legal size.
00:33We're taking the basketballers out of the population basically and leaving the horse
00:37jockeys as the breeding population.
00:40Flathead accounts for more than half of all the state's recreational catch.
00:45Concerns have long been raised about stocks, with bag limits reduced in 2015 and again
00:50in 2023.
00:52But it hasn't worked.
00:53The minister has defended the state's handling of the fishery, but he says some fishers haven't
00:58been following the rules.
01:00Warning, success depends on people doing the right thing.
01:04We know it's still in a bad state, but what we don't want to see is a generation of recreational
01:08fishers not having the opportunity to go fishing.
01:11I'd be devastated, yeah, bloody hell.
01:15Fishers today had mixed reactions to a ban, but had noticed the decline in numbers.
01:20They don't seem to be as easy to catch these days.
01:22They don't seem to be the size that they're required to be.
01:25The closure is indefinite.
01:27A restocking program is going to be taking fish from well-stocked areas like around Flinders
01:32Island and move them to the southeast, with numbers to be reassessed in a few years' time.
01:38In the meanwhile, fishers are being asked to get a taste for other species.
01:43Think about yellowtail kingfish, wrasse, mackerel, Australian salmon.
01:48There are plenty of opportunities to fish in the southeast.
01:50It's not for Tasmania's favourite fish.
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