Seafood Industry of Victoria

Mallacoota is Victoria's most isolated fishing port and is located 542km E of Melbourne. The township of Mallacoota and the small port are located on the protected waters of the lower inlet. The Mallacoota inlet consists of two interconnected main lakes referred to as the top lake and the bottom (seaward) lake.

Mallacoota is a small coastal town with a population of 1200 surrounded by natural bushland. This number swells during summer when holidaymakers spend time at the seaside town enjoying swimming, fishing and boating.

The fishing industry started back in the 1830s when Mallacoota was a deep sea whaling port.

Some of the first fishermen came from the Gippsland Lakes to fish at Mallacoota Inlet. The fishers made their camp in tents along the bank before returning home after the winter netting season.

After World War II other types of fishing started up like shark fishing, rock lobster fishing and abalone diving.

Abalone diving is the major fishery in Mallacoota. There are 21 abalone licence holders based at Mallacoota with 18 selling their catch to the local Abalone Fishermen's Co-operative. The co-operative processes the abalone for export markets in Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan. The cooperative provides important employment to the local community employing five full-time workers and 30 casual staff.

Haul seine netting occurs in the bottom lake only. The top lake is closed to commercial fishing. The use of staked mesh nets or gill nets are banned in Mallacoota inlet except for catching prawns for bait. The fresh fish caught are iced by the individual fishers and sent by road to fish markets in Melbourne. Not a lot of the locally caught fish is sold locally. The main species caught by the lake fishers are luderick, black bream, silver trevally, southern garfish, tailor, sea mullet and King George whiting. The recent voluntary buy-out of bays and inlet licences saw four licences from Mallacoota Inlet returned. There are now only four net fishers left in the inlet.

Some experimental prawn fishing using set nets started during the late 1980s. At the start you needed an experimental permit, now there is an endorsement added to the licence allowing you to catch prawns.

There are a couple rock lobster fishers located at Mallacoota.

The opening to the inlet closes periodically due to a build up of ocean sand. This affects the inlet. In 1994 when a sand bar closed the inlet entrance lots of algae grew due to the warmer water temperatures resulted in a small fish kill in the top lake.