Anglers urged to look out for tagged Mulloway!

Over the past few weeks, I’ve has been hosting workshops with anglers across Victoria to kick off the new mulloway tagging project. The project is funded through the Victorian Fisheries Authority, by Recreational Fishing License Fees. The project aims to tag 2000 mulloway over the next three years to investigate broad-scale movement patterns across Victoria and potentially interstate. While the mulloway citizen science project has provided important information on the early life stages of mulloway, the lack of data for older individuals remains a knowledge gap.  Understanding the connectivity and movement patterns of mulloway between estuarine nursery habitats and marine waters is particularly essential to interpreting population structures and obtaining a more complete picture of the species life history.

This tagging project also offers anglers the opportunity to practice catch and release fishing while helping to improve our knowledge on the species. With training almost complete and tagging underway, anglers across Victoria and South East SA are urged to be on the lookout for tagged mulloway – see image below. Recaptured tagged fish are encouraged to be returned to the water to enhance the data we can collect. If you catch a mulloway, please report the tag and recapture details (total fish length, location of capture) to the email or phone number provided on the tag. You can follow the project and read about recaptures via our Facebook Page (www.facebook.com/groups/mullowaycitizenscience/).

Anglers- Be on the look out for tagged mulloway across Victoria and South East SA