North Australian FISH FINDER TM forums

Anyone know where i can buy some tags. Ive had a look at nsw fisheries site and theres now where i can buy them. Any advice.

double haul wrote:Anyone know where i can buy some tags. Ive had a look at nsw fisheries site and theres now where i can buy them. Any advice.

Mate send Balls a PM he will know for sure..

G'day Double Haul

I have sent an e-mail to the person who allocates the Bill fish tags, I will follow up with a phone call to him on Monday. I am trying to source enough tags for the Bilfish comp 29th-31st of October & include enough Billfish tags for the local anglers chasing Billfish. Due to a history of tags not being accounted for & returned by some anglers over the years, we may have a better chance if the tags are issued to one source & a spread sheet retained with the tag number info, who it was issued to & when, better still returned after a Billfish is tagged. The NTGFA has also had difficulty obtaining Billfish tags for Bill fish comps for the reasons stated, to my knowledge there is no actual cost, in most cases is a deposit is held until the tags are returned by the angler. Leave it with me & as soon as I can speak to him I will let you know how I went.

Do you have a tagging applicator to suit the Billfish tags, as I you have to either buy them & or you can make them, its pretty easy to make if you have some basic tools & the inclination, cheers Balls.

Cheers balls, keep us up to date with the tags as im keen as. Ive got a tag pole sitting in the cupboard gathering dust. Do i have to be a gfaa member to tag fish?

You could try Phil Hall at Nt Fisheries, he may be able to point you in the right direction. I know the are like rocking horse(you know what) especially the metal tags.
I going to the South Gutter late this arvo, fishing over night, then trying for
Billies tommorrow, South Gutter to North Gutter and across the Fenton Patches on the way home.
Might catch you out there.

G'day Double Haul

G'day Double Haul/all

You don't have to be a member of the GFAA to tag fish, however tags are generally issued to game fishing clubs for sanctioned tournaments & or specific areas Fisheries are monitoring & or interested in, a bit like the Mackerel gene tag program currently running in the NT. The Billfish tags are all NSW tags & and any sanctioned GFAA tournaments will normally only accept those NSW tags. If you are interested in game fishing there are a number of game fishing clubs in the NT, just depends on where you live & what you are interested in & I'll let you know about the tags as soon as I can.

The Billfish tags are now a muscle tag, its like a small plastic head with a small hole through the middle which slides over the tag needle, the plastic head has a mono style line which the red tag with the tag number is attached to. The idea is to allow the tag to stream line flat against the Bill fish so as not to impact on their speed & or cause bubble trail to attract predators. With these tags a poor angled tag shot wouldn't be as bad as the other tags used on Sharks & Pelagics which are one piece tags.

Tag shots are recommended up in the shoulder blade just below the dorsal, the tag cards normally have the preferred location of the tag on the tag.

I have asked Mal Miles from the charter boat Hyland C to send through a copy of the estimated weight by length ratio for Sails & Black Marln which will help any one who hasn't had much to do with Billfish, Sailfish weights are normally well & truly over estimated by any one new those species, mainly due to their thin profile.

For any one who hasn't had much to do with Bill fish, Sails aren't usually to bad, but care should be taken with either Sails or Blacks when attempting to take hold of them by the bill for what ever reason, especially Blacks that come in green next to the boat, there have been a number of severe injuries & the odd fatality from injuries from lack of caution or just a fish that went beserk at the side of the boat & caught the crew off guard. This is not aimed at any one, as I know there have been a lot of fishos starting to chase Bill fish recently who may not have had the opportunity to see some of the previous encounters where the Billfish inflicted serious injuries. Another thing with Billfish is they have an acidic style chemical on their bill & its also like glasspaper, if you handle a lot & dont wear gloves your hands end up with bits of flesh falling off, sorry to make it sound like Billfish should be avoided like the plague, a bit of prior knowledge might help some one out in this instance, cheers Balls.