ENDANGERED ANYTHING YET?

There is a spot on the Yarra where I have fished regularly over the years that is close to the centre of Warburton. It’s good fly water with the only drawback being that there is a walking track along bank. This allows easy access to the whole river, resulting in the world and his wife, their pet dog and son on his bike turning up. Still if you avoid sunny weekends and school holidays it can actually be quiet enough to enjoy yourself, and you may for a few minutes be able to fool yourself you are out in the bush. That’s if you don’t get your line snagged on a shopping trolley.
I was there the other day, the water was warm, the midges were everywhere, and tiny trout were jumping into the air trying to catch something, or perhaps just trying to draw my attention. I got only one accusatory “have you caught anything yet?” yelled out to me all day. “Ah! The tranquillity.”
What I did have however was a confrontation when packing up with a strange beaded little woman who accused me of “endangering the fish.” To be more specific the grayling. Anyone who’s seen me fish will tell you I’m not endangering anything, but it did get me asking around about the Yarra’s grayling.
I must put my hand up and confess, I have caught Yarra Grayling (Prototroctes maraena) while fly fishing for trout. They take wet flies and nymphs. They are generally small (a 12” grayling is a full sized fish), silvery blue torpedoes and fight well for their size. They aren’t beautiful with long dorsal fins (like Thymallus thymallus) but are pretty in their own way. I think they would take dry flies too but because they are endangered I’ve never targeted a rising fish I thought was a grayling. In my defence I should also say I’ve always released them if caught by accident.
A retired friend of mine (who for obvious reasons will not be named) said he targeted them years ago and they took small dry flies (#16’s down) but wouldn’t move to take them, you have to cast it onto their nose. He also said that when they are rising on the Yarra it’s normally to balling midges so I guess you could try something like a Griffiths Gnat if you were going to break the law, which I hope you aren’t, there’s plenty of trout in there without resorting to poaching protected species.
From discussions on the riverbank it appears a common experience to catch a grayling or two now and again. Some bait fishermen say they catch them ALL the time, and they tell my they know they are protected and release them too. They don’t seem that rare or endangered from these initial enquiries - perhaps even making something of a comeback. Of course all the documented studies I have found suggest the Grayling are in a bad way but they are funded by the green anti-trout lobby inside the DPI so until there is some real independent work done I’ll believe what I see, and what my own network tells me.
What I was told by people on the riverbank was that they have caught Macquarie Perch out of the Yarra even though they haven’t been stocked since the 1920’s. These fish are supposed to need much warmer water to breed which would make them either over 80 years old or perhaps the experts are wrong about these fish too.
Finally a little story from the news a few weeks back. This year environmental agencies have been culling brumbies (wild horses) in the alpine high country. Their concern is that they are damaging the fragile ecosystem. In fact there are reports that they want all brumbies removed. Up until a few years ago some friends of mine used to have cattle in these very areas. They (the cattle not my friends) were removed, after 150 years, because of similar pressure from environmentalists. The delicate balance, upset by this intervention has caused an explosion in brumbie numbers. The answer is perhaps to just put the cattle back, in a limited and monitored basis. The cattle have the added advantage of keeping the fuel load down, a real safety concern for the rural community. The moral of the tale, for people who can’t figure it out for themselves, is that you can’t take a delicately balanced eco-system that has worked for 150 years and just subtract a species and expect a better result than from adding one. Remember foxes, rabbits and cane toads. It is a lesson that some people haven’t learnt, and the worry is that these seem to include key policy makers. Some people are just blinded by their own evangelical “vegan” zeal but most people are reasonable. These people need reminding that trout eradication isn’t a cure to the perceived grayling decline.
Lets help native fish species through a program of habitat improvement – remove a few weirs and let them run to/ from the sea, clean the river and bay of Port Melbourne’s pollution. Stop cutting down all the shade trees on the banks; if you’re going to remove willows from a section do so slowly over several growing seasons and replant with natives as you go.
If not the real endangered species won’t be the fish it will be us fishermen. .