East coast Spanish mackerel fishery
Changes from 1 July 2023
- The extended charter trip limit has been removed.
- The total allowable commercial catch is adjusted to 165 tonnes for each fishing season from 2023.
- Seasonal closures apply to recreational fishers on licensed charter fishing trips.
Fishery symbols
- SM: Spanish mackerel fishery
Management
Operating area
The SM symbol can be used only in the area defined for the east coast line fishery symbol(s) appearing on the same licence:
- Area of the L1 line fishery
- Area of the L2 line fishery
- Area of the L3 line fishery
- Area of the L8 line fishery
Quota
The fishery is a quota-managed fishery:
- total allowable commercial catch
- individual transferable quotas (ITQs) units allocated to each licence.
Licences and permits
To operate in the fishery, you need a:
- primary commercial fishing licence with
- an SM symbol
- and
- an L1, L2, L3 or L8 symbol
- commercial fisher licence for the person in charge of fishing activities.
A filleting permit is required to fillet this species.
While fishing in the rocky reef fishery under a L1, L2, L3 or L8 symbol, a fisher with:
- a C1 or C2 symbol on that licence – may also take crab under those symbols if they hold sufficient crab quota
- a SM symbol on that licence – may also take Spanish mackerel under that symbol if they hold sufficient Spanish mackerel quota
- a RQ symbol on that licence – may also take reef line quota species if they hold sufficient quota of the relevant quota category.
Otherwise, you must not take fish in more than 1 commercial fishery at the same time.
Reporting and monitoring
Commercial fishers must:
- report trip and catch notices
- pre-trip notice
- amending notice
- transhipment notice
- prior notice
- weight notice
- catch disposal record
- retained fish notice
- emergency notice
- complete daily logbooks
- keep sale dockets
- have vessel tracking on their boats
- comply with state marine park and Great Barrier Reef Marine Park zoning rules.
Closures
Equipment
- Fish can be taken using fishing lines.
- Restrictions depend on the fishing symbol you are operating under.
- Fishers cannot fish from land (must fish from a boat) except in those fisheries (hand-harvest) that area allow to fish from land, as per the Fisheries (Commercial Fisheries) Regulation 2019.
Target species
- Spanish mackerel (Scomberomorus commerson)