00:02Leon van Wienen has been trapping pallidus octopus commercially in the Lower Spencer Gulf for 14 years.
00:09He's been forced to target a smaller species of octopus since his monthly catch dropped dramatically early last year.
00:17I actually rang nights there at Sardie and said I think we've got a problem because there was just no
00:24pallidus.
00:25And it went from like 300 kilo down to 15.
00:29He couldn't have found a better person to tell.
00:32Not only is Mike Steer the face of South Australia's algal bloom response,
00:36he also studied pallidus octopus populations in waters off South Australia.
00:41Despite the devastating impact of the algal bloom on marine life, he believes the species will make a comeback.
00:48We'll just have to wait over the season of reproduction which for this species is now in autumn.
00:57Algal bloom recovery research is focused on primary species including calamari, king george whiting, garfish, blue crab and prawns.
01:07Cephalopods including squid and octopus are expected to be the quickest to recover.
01:13Questions remain over whether the algal bloom killed pallidus octopus in the Spencer Gulf when most of the early impact
01:20was in the adjacent Gulf, Gulf St. Vincent.
01:22It may suggest that there's other underlying ecological ramifications happening that we don't know about.
01:31Fisherman Leon van Weenen blames the algal bloom, but he's hopeful the species will recover.
01:38Cephalopods in general, they were really noticed, they were hit hard and so this is going to be a wait
01:47and see.
01:47It's now up to scientists to come up with answers to questions posed by the algal bloom.
01:53See you soon.
01:53Yeah, you have to keep it in time.
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