Courtney et al., 2007:

• "An estimated 119,577 sea snakes were caught every year between 2003 and 2007 by the Queensland east coast trawl fishery alone.

• Up to 50 per cent of sea snakes die within the first 96 hours after being caught by Queensland east coast trawlers.
  

• The Queensland Government and the Queensland commercial trawl fishers are legally obliged to address the problem and minimise sea snake – trawl interactions.
  

• Certain by-catch reduction devices, when fitted properly to the trawl net, can reduce sea snake catch rates significantly. Installation of the by-catch reduction device “Fisheye” in the trawl net resulted in 63 per cent reduction in sea snake catch rate with no reduction in prawn catch rate.
  

• In the Commonwealth Northern Prawn Trawl Fishery between 81,000 and 120,000 sea snakes were caught annually in the early 1990s  (Wassenberg et al. 1994, Ward 1996).
  

• 48.5 per cent of sea snakes caught from research and commercial prawn trawling die as a result of being trawled in the Northern Prawn trawl Fishery (Wassenberg et al. 2001)."
  

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Citation and/or URL

From presentation on pending report FRDC #2005/053: Reducing the impact of Queensland's trawl fisheries on protected sea snakes.  Tony Courtney, Ben Schemel, Rohan Wallace (QDPI & F).  

Report funded by Queensland Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries (QDPI & F) and Fisheries Research and Development Corporation (FDRC # 2005/053).

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Spatial Coverage

Queensland East Coast Trawl Fishery 

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Temporal Coverage

2003 - 2007

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Update Frequency

Final report pending.  

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Other Information

Ward, T. M. (1996a), ‘Sea Snake By-catch of Prawn Trawlers on the Northern Australian Continental Shelf’, Australian Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research, vol. 47, pp. 631-5.

Wassenberg, T. J., D. A. Milton & C. Y. Burridge (2001), ‘Survival rates of sea snakes caught by demersal trawlers in northern and eastern Australia’, Biological Conservation, vol. 100, pp. 271-80.

Wassenberg, T. J., J. P. Salini, H. Heatwole & J. D. Kerr (1994), ’Incidental Capture of Sea-snakes (Hydrophiidae) by Prawn Trawlers in the Gulf of Carpentaria, Australia’, Australian Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research, vol. 45, pp. 429-43.

Heales, D.S., Gregor, R., Wakeford, J., Wang, Y.G., Yarrow, J., Milton, D. (2008) Tropical prawn trawl bycatch of fish and seasnakes reduced by Yarrow Fisheye Bycatch Reduction Device. Fisheries Research, 89, 1, 76-83.