After a week of extreme temperatures of
nearly 50C and thousands of dead bats dropping from trees because of the extreme
temperatures in parts of New South Wales and record rainfall in Sydney another
disaster has unfolded along the Cooloola Coast as thousands of dead fish were
reported to Department of Environment and Heritage Protection between Teewah
and Double Island Point.
Once again no one has a clue as to why
thousands of fish have washed up dead along kilometers of the Cooloola Coast.
And thousands more have been reported to
The Gympie Times as lining the tide line along more than 1km at Rainbow Beach.
Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service
rangers from Rainbow Beach had also noted dead fish during their beach patrols,
an EHP representative said on Friday.
The representative said the department had
received two reports so far through its pollution hotline, involving large
numbers of fish between Teewah and DIP.
Rainbow Beach resident Ian Giesemann, who
supplied the photograph (above), said they looked like leatherjackets, an
assessment confirmed by Tin Can Bay fisher Joe McLeod.
"They are a small species of
leatherjacket that often gather in dense schools, sometimes in plague
proportions and die.
"They are also a common trawler
by-catch fish. They float when they die and sometimes wash up.
"It often happens on Fraser
Island," he said.
"There would be about 10,000 fish
washed up on one 800m stretch alone," Mr. Giesemann said.
"There were about 10 to 15 fish (about
100mm or a bit larger) a meter," he said.
The EHP representative said fisheries
officers had taken part in joint investigations with EHP and it seemed they
might be trawler by-catch.
"As in this case, the fish have mostly
washed up over a large, relatively uninhabited area, the fish will be left to
decompose naturally," the department representative said.
1 comment:
Check them for radiation, lots of die offs along SA shores as well, considering Fukashima rad levels have gone up
Post a Comment