8 results

Seafood CRC: addressing roadblocks to the adoption of economics in fisheries policy (2013/748.20 Communal)

Project number: 2013-748.20
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $25,312.50
Principal Investigator: Caleb Gardner
Organisation: University of Tasmania (UTAS)
Project start/end date: 30 Sep 2014 - 29 Jun 2015
Contact:
FRDC
TAGS
Stock Assessment
Resource Enhancement
Individual Transferable Quota
Fisheries Management
Economic
SPECIES
Western Rock Lobster
Southern Rock Lobster
Royal Red Prawn
Giant Scarlet Prawn
Red Prawn

Need

Producing peer-reviewed publication on these topics is part of the suite of approaches aimed at increasing uptake of FH projects. Scientific papers enable exchange of ideas internationally. They are part of the process of changing fishery management which needs these types of outputs to defend decisions.

Objectives

1. Examination of the process of changing management in Australia resulting in the increased use of economics
2. Increase factual awareness of the potential for enhancement in Australia

Final report

ISBN: 978-1-86295-840-1
Authors: Timothy Emery Caleb Gardner Ian Cartwright and Anthony Hart
Final Report • 2015-09-04 • 652.83 KB
2013-748.20-DLD.pdf

Summary

This project has led to the development of three journal articles examining how the use of economic analyses and stock enhancement can lead to improved economic outcomes in Australian wild-capture commercial fisheries. The Seafood Cooperative Research Centre (Seafood CRC) Future Harvest (FH) projects identified some of the challenges and opportunities associated with implementing bio-economic approaches and stock enhancement within fisheries management frameworks. Much of this discourse was contained however in technical reports, newsletters and other project-linked documentation (e.g. milestone reports). Thus there was a need (and space) to document the adoption of bio-economics and stock enhancement within fisheries management frameworks, associated challenges and the process of change management in Australian fisheries within peer-reviewed journal articles.

People
PROJECT NUMBER • 2009-712
PROJECT STATUS:
COMPLETED

Seafood CRC: future harvest theme leadership

The CRC has developed the Future Harvest theme business plan to deliver the following outcomes: Fisheries management delivering maximum benefit from the resource while maintaining stocks above sustainability indicators Novel management strategies in place which increase economic yield from...
ORGANISATION:
University of Tasmania (UTAS)
TAGS
Training
Sustainability
Rac Wa
Harvest Strategy
Fishing Effort
SPECIES
Western Rock Lobster
Southern Rock Lobster
Blacklip Abalone
Greenlip Abalone
Prawns

Seventh International Conference and Workshop on Lobster Biology and Management

Project number: 2003-301
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $20,000.00
Principal Investigator: Stewart Frusher
Organisation: University of Tasmania (UTAS)
Project start/end date: 29 Nov 2003 - 15 Nov 2005
Contact:
FRDC
TAGS
Workshop
Training
Fisheries Management
Ecosystem
Conference
SPECIES
Western Rock Lobster
Eastern Rock Lobster
Southern Rock Lobster
Bugs
Tropical Rock Lobsters

Need

In 1999/2000 the estimated value of Australia’s rock lobster industry was $544 million and this represented 23% of the landed value of all Australian fisheries.

As Australia’s premier fisheries export there is a need to ensure that our lobster fisheries are managed sustainably and that they clearly demonstrate to the world that our research and management is ‘state-of-the-art’ and ‘worlds best practice’. By hosting this conference in Australia, it will enable the maximum number of fishery scientists, managers and industry representatives to attend and meet with scientists, managers and fishers associated with lobster fisheries around the world.

An area of particular interest to Australia includes lobster ecosystem models and assessment. There is a need in all of Australia’s lobster fisheries to address ecosystem issues for both Environment Australia and forthcoming ecological sustainable development requirements. In association with these requirements there is a need for Australia’s premier fisheries export industry to obtain and maintain industry accreditation for current and developing markets. Several Australian States, with the support of the FRDC Rock Lobster and Aquaculture Subprogram are investigating the potential for a rock lobster aquaculture industry. To aid this development there is a need to be abreast of the latest developments around the world.

The conference will also provide an opportunity to hear of the application of new technology and to form partnerships with experts pioneering new developments.

Objectives

1. To host the 7th International Conference and Workshop on Lobster Biology and Management in Hobart.
2. To publish the proceedings in a peer reviewed scientific journal

Final report

ISBN: 1-86295-271-X
Author: Stewart Frusher
Final Report • 2006-04-03 • 702.43 KB
2003-301-DLD.pdf

Project products

Article • 101.90 MB
2003-301 New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research Vol 39 No. 2 2005.pdf
Article • 118.68 MB
2003-301 New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research Vol 39 No. 3 2005.pdf

Rock Lobster Post Harvest Subprogram: optimising water quality in rock lobster post-harvest processes

Project number: 2000-252
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $136,226.00
Principal Investigator: Stephen Battaglene
Organisation: University of Tasmania (UTAS)
Project start/end date: 29 Dec 2000 - 8 May 2006
Contact:
FRDC
TAGS
Post Harvest
Physiology
Harvest Strategy
Fishing Technology
Fishing Gear
SPECIES
Western Rock Lobster
Southern Rock Lobster
Tropical Rock Lobsters

Need

There are concerns that poor water quality may be having an affect on the health of post-capture rock lobsters. This project addresses this in three ways:

1. Determining the optimal level of ammonia in holding and transport systems. This will contribute to the understanding of optimal system design.

2. Understanding the mechanism of ammonia toxicity. This will enable industry to develop methods to counteract the harmful effects.

3. Providing information to the rock lobster industry in the appropriate form to ensure uptake of the results of research on optimising water quality, specifically in the area of oxygen and ammonia.

Objectives

1. Production of a manual on optimising the provision of oxygen during rock lobster post-harvest processes
2. Determine the median lethal concentration (LC-50) of ammonia to adult southern and western rock lobsters (stressed and unstressed).
3. Determine the physiological consequences of exposing lobsters to sub-lethal ammonia concentrations, and the consequences of further exposing lobsters to acute post-harvest stressors.
4. Production of a manual on ammonia problems during rock lobster post-harvest processes

Final report

ISBN: 1-86295-065-2
Authors: Stephen Battaglene Jennifer Cobcroft Mark Powell and Bradley Crear
Final Report • 2005-01-04 • 859.67 KB
2000-252-DLD.pdf

Summary

Rock lobsters can be exposed to poor water quality during all stages of handling and holding prior to going to market. Poor water quality reduces the time a lobster can be held alive and how many animals can be held in a system and thus may reduce profit. The quality of water can be assessed using many different measurements, with two of the most important being oxygen and ammonia (a form of nitrogen). An earlier FRDC funded study investigated oxygen and how it influenced the holding of rock lobsters. However, prior to the current study there was very limited understanding of the harmful effects of ammonia to rock lobsters. Ammonia can accumulate in holding and transport facilities via natural release of ammonia from lobsters, and from the bacterial decomposition of faeces, excess feed, and dead animals. Ammonia can be harmful to crustaceans in small amounts (or low concentrations) and even fatal if concentrations get too high. The toxicity of ammonia to aquatic animals becomes greater when other factors such as low dissolved oxygen, low salinity, and/or low pH (acidity of the water) also interact. In liquids, total ammonia comprises un-ionised ammonia (NH3), which is the more toxic component, and ionised ammonia (NH4 +; ammonium) in equilibrium. Lobsters can become stressed (having a higher demand upon their biological systems) during holding and handling but it is uncertain what effect this stress has on the ability of lobsters to tolerate ammonia. This project provided a better understanding of the effect of ammonia and other water quality measurements, on the health of stressed and unstressed lobsters.

Project products

Guide • 14.10 MB
2000-252-DLD-Guide No.2.pdf
Guide • 26.47 MB
2000-252-DLD-Guide No.1.pdf

Rock Lobster Enhancement and Aquaculture Subprogram: advancing the hatchery propagation of rock lobsters

Project number: 2000-214
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $712,262.00
Principal Investigator: Arthur Ritar
Organisation: University of Tasmania (UTAS)
Project start/end date: 16 Oct 2000 - 31 Mar 2008
Contact:
FRDC
SPECIES
Western Rock Lobster
Eastern Rock Lobster
Southern Rock Lobster
Tropical Rock Lobsters

Need

Commercial in confidence. To know more about this project please contact FRDC.

Objectives

Commercial in confidence

Rock Lobster Enhancement and Aquaculture Subprogram: evaluating the release and survival of juvenile rock lobsters released for enhancement purposes

Project number: 2000-185
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $279,254.00
Principal Investigator: Caleb Gardner
Organisation: University of Tasmania (UTAS)
Project start/end date: 23 Nov 2000 - 4 May 2005
Contact:
FRDC
TAGS
Mortality
Harvest Strategy
Habitat
Economic
Aquaculture
SPECIES
Western Rock Lobster
Eastern Rock Lobster
Southern Rock Lobster
Tropical Rock Lobsters

Need

Enhancement offers a mechanism to increase production of rock lobsters, both by increasing production from coastal reef and by providing a mechanism for biologically neutrality in the harvest of puerulus (and thus overcomes a barrier to ongrowing). Additional benefits include the ability to increase biomass and egg production in regions considered depleted, which enhances resource sustainability.

While the potential benefits of enhancement are broad, the value of the concept is critically affected by the survival of juveniles after release. Low survival would reduce the economic benefit and also nullify assumptions on the biologically neutrality of the harvest of puerulus.

The proposed project addresses the need for information on how to release juveniles (or condition juveniles prior to release) so that survival is optimised. Future release efforts will be assisted by information on habitat choice, so that return from enhancement is maximised, in terms of animals surviving through to harvest size. Large scale experiments tracking the cohorts of released juveniles will evaluate enhancement on a pilot-scale - patterns apparent in small scale experiments may not hold true in larger releases so larger scale experimental releases are considered vital.

Objectives

1. To develop release protocols to minimise mortality based on the anti-predator behaviour of wild and cultured juvenile J. edwardsii.
2. To provide recommendations on release (micro)habitats for optimising the benefit of enhancement operations.
3. To evaluate the conclusions of objectives 1 and 2 in pilot scale enhancement experiments.

Final report

ISBN: 1-86295-189-6
Author: Caleb Gardner
Final Report • 2005-04-09 • 4.12 MB
2000-185-DLD.pdf

Rock Lobster Enhancement and Aquaculture Subprogram: propagation techniques

Project number: 1999-315
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $149,889.00
Principal Investigator: Piers Hart
Organisation: University of Tasmania (UTAS)
Project start/end date: 5 Sep 1999 - 12 Jun 2002
Contact:
FRDC
SPECIES
Western Rock Lobster
Southern Rock Lobster
Tropical Rock Lobsters

Need

Expansion of output from the rock lobster fishery cannot be achieved using traditional fishing methods as most wild stocks are already fully exploited. It is therefore necessary to develop an aquaculture technique that can increase the long term production of rock lobster, in a sustainable manner.

The outcomes of the FRDC workshop (project 98/300) and an earlier Perth workshop sponsored by the DISR, confirmed that culture of puerulus from eggs is biologically feasible and also appears economically viable. Production of puerulus from eggs has been achieved on a small scale in both Japan and NZ. The Japanese are far enough advanced to be considering release of cultured puerulus onto artificial reefs in the next few years. In Tasmania the phyllosoma of the southern rock lobster have been reared through 70% of the larval cycle with good survival (25%).

The priorities for further research were identified as:
· improving larval survival & growth
· improving system design/environmental requirements
· improving nutrition
· reducing the length of the larval phase.

Lower priorities were identified as:
· out of season spawning
· improving gamete quality.

However, as gametes are readily available from wild-caught broodstock, it was considered that these issues could be left for a future project.

The next stage must be to coordinate and expand the research in Australia under one project through the FRDC and CRC, in order to focus our effort on addressing the research priorities that were identified during the workshop.

This project identifies the priorities for the first year of the project and addresses a few issues that need to be determined in order to design a longer term project.

Objectives

1. Develop an artificial diet acceptable to phyllosoma of three species of rock lobster, that is water stable and easily manipulated.· Project 1. Characterise morphology and function of larval digestive system (Method 1).· Project 2. Examine biochemical changes in cultured and wild phyllosoma (Method 2).· Project 3. Develop a best guess formulated diet for use in nutritional experiments (Method 3).· Project 4. Examine the suitability of diets for phyllosoma of rock lobster (Method 4).
2. Examine mass culture systems and determine environmental requirements for phyllosoma of three species of rock lobster.· Project 5. Examine mass culture systems using southern rock lobster phyllosoma (Method 5).· Project 6. Examine environmental requirements of southern rock lobster phyllosoma (Method 6).· Project 7. Examine environmental requirements of tropical rock lobster phyllosoma (Method 7).· Project 8. Examine the effects of temperature and food density on phyllosoma of western rock lobster phyllosoma (Method 8).
3. Develop hormonal control of moulting in rock lobsters.· Project 9. Scoping study to examine the hormonal sequence controlling moulting in phyllosoma of a test species (Method 9).
4. Determine the health status of phyllosoma of southern rock lobster under culture conditions.· Project 10. Monitoring health of southern rock lobster phyllosoma (Method 10).

Final report

Final Report • 10.82 MB
1999-315-DLD.pdf

Rock Lobster Enhancement and Aquaculture Subprogram: preliminary investigation towards ongrowing puerulus to enhance rock lobster stocks while providing animals for commercial culture

Project number: 1999-314
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $57,064.00
Principal Investigator: Caleb Gardner
Organisation: University of Tasmania (UTAS)
Project start/end date: 29 Dec 1999 - 29 Nov 2000
Contact:
FRDC
SPECIES
Western Rock Lobster
Southern Rock Lobster

Need

Development of a rock lobster aquaculture industry through the harvest of puerulus from the wild cannot proceed if there is a net loss of animals from the wild fishery. The concept of removing puerulus from the wild has received widespread opposition from participants in rock lobster fishing industries, and managers of the resource, as the resource is considered to be highly exploited. Rock lobster fisheries management policy in most states is specifically directed towards stock rebuilding and it is perceived that additional extraction by puerulus removal runs counter to those policies.

Current research on techniques for the extraction and on-growing of puerulus from the wild have proceeded with an assumption that puerulus extraction should be "biologically neutral". It has been proposed that "biological neutrality" can be achieved by a proportional reduction in catch of adult animals, either through a reduction in effort (eg removal of pots) or through buy-out of quota (in ITQ management). However, this mechanism for achieving biological neutrality has been criticised, as puerulus extraction is likely to occur in sheltered, heavily exploited regions - while the effort removed from the fishery may have been directed to a completely different region. In this scenario, puerulus extraction could lead to local depletion and loss of egg production, despite the concurrent reduction in effort.

The proposed project is directed to an alternative mechanism for compensating for the removal of puerulus. Reseeded animals can be released back to the same areas from which they were extracted so no localised depletion will result. Reseeding the area with animals additional to those required for biological neutrality will provide an enhancement benefit. This system has benefits to the fishing industry through enhanced yield, and also to the proposed aquaculture industry through access.

The potentially valuable on-growing industry is reliant upon the development of a mechanism for compensating for puerulus loss that does not harm the wild fishery.

Objectives

1. To develop methods to capture large numbers of 1 year old benthic juvenile rock lobsters, both for providing control animals and for monitoring survival of reseeded animals. (note that this is not puerulus collection)
2. To determine the extent of movement of reseeded and control juveniles after release, to assist in estimation of survival
3. To develop methods to assess relative survival of cultured juvenile lobsters released into a natural habitat.

Final report

Authors: Caleb Gardner David Mills Sam Ibbott Simon Wilcox and Bradley Crear
Final Report • 2000-04-01 • 574.20 KB
1999-314-DLD.pdf
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