1000 Snapper Found Floating Off New Zealand Coast

Just saw this in the local advocate.

More than 1000 snapper have been found floating off Northland's coast, mystifying Ministry of Fisheries staff. Some of the fish, founding off Ruakaka, 29km southeast of Whangarei, by recreational fisherman on Saturday, were sent to National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa) for testing, the Northern Advocate reported. MFish district compliance manager for Northland Darren Edwards said the fish were alive but "looked as if they had been stunned".

This is very strange, the fish were still alive but were in a stunned state? Further more there were around 1000 of them, thats a lot of fish.

Has this ever happened before? And what could stun up to 1000 fish?

Sources:
www.northernadvocate.co.nz...
www.stuff.co.nz...

Cheers
Brady

reply to post by GetRadNZ


hey where did you read that on? sources??? this reminds me of all those dead fish that just appeared a couple months ago, really eerie if you ask me.


~one love~

An underground detonation or eruption of something? Don't fish die/get stunned when blasts go off underwater?

reply to post by asianpersuasion


Oh sorry, forgot to post the source. It doesn't say much about it.

www.stuff.co.nz...

Just found this aswell, much more about it.

www.northernadvocate.co.nz...

Cheers
Brady

Shockwaves usually kill fish because they vibrate their internals until they rupture.
Something like this musta been electricity imo.
A shock that stopped the muscles to move.

Maybe something that went overboard over a school of fish imo.

Yeah I read this in the NZ herald. They mentioned they think it might be from fish that fell out of a trawler net as they were being hauled in. If they hit the water hard that could explain why they would be stunned - but wouldn't the trawler just sweep back around and scoop them up again?

What has the weather been like up there the last couple of days - possible lightning strike? Very curious incident, could be a lot more to it - nice find, dude.

reply to post by Anttyk47


Yeah but this is the first time it's ever happened here. We do get oil tankers coming in and out of Ruakaka ( were the fish were found) but they never come in the shallows. I'm not sure how many fish usually travel in a school, but 1000 snapper would be a pretty big school of fish, they are pretty big fish.

Cheers
Brady

reply to post by 3finjo


Yeah I'd say that it wouldn't have been a trawler. I've never seen one in that area.
I don't think they'd leave 1000 snapper floating, that'd be a huge loss of profit.
Wouldn't it be a bit hard to trawl for Snapper? They tend to be around mussel beds a lot of the time, which is on the sea floor. They're also very sharp, which would make trawling difficult as well.

The weather here has been fine the last week. It hasn't rained in at least 7 days. And the wind hasn't been to bad.
It's pretty strange.

Cheers
Brady

reply to post by GetRadNZ


I didn't think too much about the type of fish, or size of a school of fish.
Just assumptions at work.

With what you said, i could assume that,
Some type of faulty wiring/device that was dragged in the water that was being charged with high volts could have done this. I'm not familiar with electronics/how it reacts in saltwater, or the dept that the fish swim in, but with what i do know what's all i can really conclude.

There is of/c the other two options.

It was aliens,
or,
It was the government.

Oh, you know what, after my last two conclusion i thought...

It COULD be some sort of illegal device that was purposely expereimented with.
You said they were still ALIVE on top of the water?
Image how much MONEY you can save doing something like this instead of fishing, and how much MONEY you can make.
Money money money

reply to post by Anttyk47


I guess that could be a possible explanation. I just searched 'effects of electricity on fish' and got this.

The final section of fish reaction is 'electronarcosis'. With DC this sub-section is known as galvanonarcosis. Fish become dazed and immobile and show little or no response to alternative stimuli. At this point the fish will cease to breathe for short periods. Depending on species, some will sink (eels, bullheads, initially carp and zander) and others will float (bream, pike, carp after a short period and zander after a couple of minutes but float for a long period there after). This is a critical point as long periods in the field can cause death. Conversely, shorter periods are ideal as fish will recover and return to normal.

Source:
londonfishmonger.blogspot.com...

Cheers
Brady

Of course it's an offence for a commercial fisherman to land a Snapper catch without owning Quota for the fish so sometimes fish just get dumped after being caught because the fines are too severe.

That's one option ...

Another is that a volcanic disturbance on the seabed could have released a bubble of hydrogen sulphide under a school of fish starving them of oxygenated water.

reply to post by sy.gunson


That is something that they have taken into account and I think it could be one of the best possible explanations.
I don't get how they would catch 1000 snapper, then just dump them. I don't think they would catch 1000 of them then decide to dump them, I wouldn't have caught them in the first place if i know that they needed a quota.

Cheers
Brady

reply to post by sy.gunson

Of course it's an offence for a commercial fisherman to land a Snapper catch without owning Quota for the fish so sometimes fish just get dumped after being caught because the fines are too severe.

Outside of some other bizarre answers that sounds about the most plausible to me.
They dumped an excess load to avoid being nailed for being above their quota.

Originally posted by GetRadNZ
reply to post by sy.gunson

 

I don't think they would catch 1000 of them then decide to dump them, I wouldn't have caught them in the first place if i know that they needed a quota.

Cheers
Brady

Hey Brady, it's not always possible to know in advance when you cast a net for one species where you do have quota, that what you catch is what you intended to get.

Seems odd to me however that there isn't an electronic trading floor for landing fish on somebody else's quota for a share of the profit. It's not uncommon to dump by-catches at sea under NZ's quota system.

Perhaps this just highlights that quotas aren't the total solution or don't work properly.

A rain of fish?
if it hit the sea, this would happen.
you get them on land. and there is more sea.
or it could be some new sub scanner?

Could it be an Ocean overturn?

Anyway the same thing happened in Greece a year ago. The ocean rose a few feet high within a minute and then slowly went back down. Fish then rose to the surface dead. This was caught on tape as well i might add. I'll try and find it, but hopefully someone else does before me.