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We need your help to get as much data as possible!
ANSA Queensland length to weight project. Jeremy Arnold
As a result of a discussion items raised at the 2008 and 2009 State conferences, ANSA Queensland has decided to revisit the idea of length to weight charts. The current length to weight charts have a number of inaccuracies and we have been unable to contact the person responsible (Andrew McDougal) to query this or access the data he collected.
The benefit of length to weight charts is that once established, they can be used for Statewide or local competitions so that a fish’s weight is read off the chart for a given length. This would avoid the compulsory and unnecessary killing of fish just to get a weight. Naturally, an angler could keep a fish if they so desire for eating and take a measured weight if they wish to record it as a masters capture or a record.
This project has been in progress for about 12 months now and I have collected about 1600 length/weight data points covering about 100 species. There are 20 or more data points for 25 species including 10 species with more than 50 data points.
I believe we will need at least 100 data points to give reasonably accurate predictions of weight, particularly for the larger pelagics. Naturally, the more the better, and down the track it might even be possibly to look at area differences for species.
We need your help to get as much data as possible! Please measure and weigh all fish you catch or even just the fish you keep. We would like the angler’s name and club, date and general location of capture, species common name (as per ANSA Qld handbook), and weight and overall length. If you intend to release the fish, it can be weighed alive in a bag or net and the weight of these deducted. Please measure stingrays across the wings in addition to overall length. If you keep it, let us know whether it was weighed whole or gilled and gutted. A data sheet to record this information can be downloaded from here.
There are some examples here of the relationship of length to weight shown for school mackerel, queenfish, grass emperor and sand whiting based on the data collected so far. Very promising considering that both gilled and gutted and whole weights are included in the same graphs.
Data should be emailed to jermfish13@hotmail.com or, if you do not have access to a computer, you may post it to PO Box 1022, Fortitude Valley, 4001. I hope you agree that this is a worthwhile initiative and I look forward to being overwhelmed with data in the near future!
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