The First week of July was surprising for me catching 3 previously tagged barramundi. In 4 years I have guided here, I have only crossed paths with 2 other tagged barras.
The first (pictured) was recaptured in the Pine River by Allan Murray at 620mm on 3 July, having been origonally tagged on April 17 2002 by local angler Phil Aspinall at 500mm.
The second was recapture in the Embley River two days later by Art Severn of Yowie Bay at 730mm. This fish had origonally been tagged on 18 October 2003 at 435mm, While the last fish was recaptured later that same day by Bob Gardner. His fish measured 520mm and was tagged origonally on 13 November 2006 at 480mm.
As you can see, the Weipa strain of barramundi seems to be surprisingly slow growing. This data was supplied by Bill Sawynok of Suntag who is in charge of the inshore finfish tagging program in Queensland. He confirmed that the Weipa barras do seem to have a slow growth rate compared with those on the east coast or even further south in the gulf. I guess this is another good reason to reduce the indiscriminate commercial pressure on this valuable resource.
