Threatened species decline, stocking and recovery

Conservation of eastern freshwater cod was the first such programme in Australia. A key priority was to increase the distribution in the Clarence River System and to establish a self-maintaining population in the Richmond River System (Rowland, 1985b, 1988a Ingram et al., 1990). In 1988 and 1989, a total of 29000 fish produced at the Eastern Freshwater Fish Research Hatchery was stocked at selected sites in both the Clarence and Richmond systems (Rowland, 1990). Subsequently, between 1997 and 2002, approximately 300000 fingerlings, produced at a commercial hatchery 

Since 1983, hatchery-reared fingerlings have been restocked into the Mary River System, as well as other drainages in south-eastern Queensland. Distribution and abundance have increased markedly the species is now in four river systems and numerous impoundments and, while the major goal of stocking is conservation, there is also a recreational fishery for this threatened species (Peter Kind, pers. comm.). 

Hatchery production conunenced in the late 1970s (Rowland, 1983a, 1986 CadwaUader and Gooley, 1985), and stockings were undertaken into impoundments and other locations where the species was rare or extirpated (Rowland, 2005). Since 1976, approximately 16.1 million Murray cod have been produced at government and private commercial hatcheries for stock 

20 silver perch were recorded in a survey involving 351 randomly selected sites covering 16 river valleys in the MDRS (Lintermans, 2007). 

6 Stock enhancement golden perch and Anstralian bass 

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