Bush 'n Beach Fishing Magazine Location reports & tips for fishing, boating, camping, kayaking, 4WDing in Queensland and Northern NSW
The striped marlin tagged by Al McGlashan on 17 February was recaptured in mid-May 2024 by a longline vessel fishing wide of Narooma. The commercial fishing crew kindly returned the tag to us, so we were able to download all the data held by the tag which provides highly detailed information on the vertical movements of the fish through the water column.
Modelling of the data shows that on tagging, the fish moved off the shelf area and headed to deeper water in a generally easterly direction of where it was tagged. In March it circled south (down to a location wide of Bermagui) and north (to wide off Wollongong) before heading slightly wider still to a point approx. 250km offshore from Sydney. It then tracked steadily back towards Newcastle in early April and moved in a general northly direction staying close to the continental slope, moving slightly further offshore to a point east of Port Macquarie before moving back into the continental shelf area off Port Stephens.
From there, it moved steadily south along the edge and out slightly over the continental slope area whilst working down to the Batemans Bay area in early May. From there it continued down to the Narooma area and moved slightly further offshore and back in before being caught by the commercial vessel.
The depth profile again shows the yo-yo oscillations that we have seen with the other tagged fish. With the striped marlin regularly diving, multiple times a day, down to between 50-300m+, with one dive getting close to 400m! This is likely associated with the normal foraging strategy of striped marlin. The marlin spent most of its time (over 60%) less than 10m below the surface in water between 21 and 26 °C.
Thanks again to the McGlashan team for successfully tagging the fish and the longline crew for returning the tag!
More info on the aim of the project is given on the NSW Fisheries website.
NSW Fisheries is undertaking this project in collaboration with the Australian National Sportfishing Association (NSW) and NSW Game Fishing Association.
