1-28 February 2019

Operation

During February 2019, 20 SMART drumlines were deployed for 15 days at Ballina-Lennox Head and 15 SMART drumlines for 9 days at Evans Head. Environmental conditions determined how long SMART drumlines were deployed on any given day, ranging from 5:02h to 12:02. On average, SMART drumlines were deployed daily for 8:17h at Ballina-Lennox Head and 9:22h at Evans Head.

Catches

During February 2019, five target sharks were caught (Table 1): one female Bull Shark and four Tiger Sharks (one male and three female) were caught at Ballina-Lennox Head. No-target sharks included one female Dusky Whaler and one male Common Blacktip (Table 1).  All animals were released alive. No animals were caught at Evans Head.

Comments

The total number of days that the gear was deployed was restricted because of adverse weather conditions with strong winds to 90 km h^-1 and large swell (4 to 5 m).

When the contractor responded to three alerts that had no catch, they found that they all had the bait fully intact.

One SMART drumline at Sharpes Beach, Ballina failed to set off an alert on 4 February 2019. When the contractor arrived at the SMART drumline to retrieve it at the end of the day, a Tiger Shark was found alive on the line (Table 1). The trigger magnet had broken and was repaired. The shark was tagged and released immediately.

All other caught animals triggered an alert to the DPI contractors who responded and were at the SMART drumline within an average of 20 minutes.

Table 1: The date and time of capture of species and their sizes (total length in m), sex, and status during February 2019.

*No trigger. Time is when the contractor arrived to pick up the gear at the end of the day