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Is it ok to eat fish from onka river.


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Hey everyone, I am relatively new to fishing and I am starting to enjoy fishing near the mouth of the onka river near the bend. I have been told that i shouldnt eat anything i catch from here...is this true? I figure that it should be ok as there is always tidal movement. Any help/comments would be much appreciated.

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The onkaparinga is a tidal estuary ,if you have seen the speed at which the tide flows in and out of it ,i cant see anything wrong with eating any fish from there ,i would (if i ever caught any :laugh: ) now if it was the patawalonga now there is a different story ,i wouldnt eat anything out of there ,i know it is cleaner now than it used to be but i can still remember as a kid seeing dead dogs in there and the water being a blackish color and very stinky,although through man made fords and weirs the flow of water has been somewhat stifled it still has a incoming and outgoing tide and where you fish i very near the sea anyway ,i think whoever is telling you this is getting the onk mixed up with the pat.

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OK, yer C&R crew i guess i'm one of those, have'nt killed a fish in years but even so i dont think most of us you have cataorgised there in that statement would deny anybody a feed of fresh healthy fish as we have in the past most likely taken fish for a feed. Now as for eating fish from the onk, I was about 18years old (38years ago) i bought home 2 breamfor tea we cooked em that night one for me & one for the old man, however 1 mouthful in my old man spits his piece of fish out on closer examination the breams meat had jellified I swore after this i would only C&R fish from the onk.At this time the meatworks was dumping there slurry into the onk, old nourlunga residents were pumping their effulent into the onk (I know this still happens)& there was a council tip down were the scout hall now sits.also all the road drains leed into the onk with all the crap that goes with that, oil residue etc. safe to eat fish from the onk i think not.all so fish migrate, they could have lived in the port the pat who knows? I can remember the CSIRO so time back & they found bream from the port with unsafe levels of heavy metals in the fish. estuarys the world over have pollution problems to varing degrees & think the effects of these pollutants on humans are not nessarrilly felt straight away but i think in the future you will see more of the physical effects this will cause.

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If youd seen some of the gear floating around in the onk that I have, and even just smelt the water in some areas, you definitely wouldnt eat anything from there...In saying that though, there is a big difference between resident fish from then old noarlunga area versus some of the bread n butter fish [whiting, gar, tommies, salmon] up at the mouth and southport SLSC where it is still tidal as well, but actually gets a proper flushing.

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Who told you? Are they concerned about bacterial contamination' date=' heavy metal accumulation, parasites, scromboid, dioxins, ciguatera or radiation [/quote']I can live with the parasites, dioxins,ciguatera and radiation..........but I"ll give the scromboids a miss.......bit too crunchy for my liking. :laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh:
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Let's clear up a few fallacies here fellas.In 1990 when I arrived in Aus the first of five wetlands right along the Onka were in the process of being built, they are all now complete and although the trash racks are an imperfect anti pollutant system, they are in place and the wetlands themselves do a good job of settling out storm-water pollutants where there were no wetlands before. Moreover, the new housing scheme by Perry's Bend had as part of its concession to build, the requirement for a storm-water pond now situated on the opposite side of Perry's Bend to catch run-off storm-water!Metro Meat Works, while it was running, was a disgusting pollutant of the River which would have killed, realistically,thousands of Native fish in its time of operation (I have personally reported these fish kills and seen DENR lifting 6X4 trailer loads of dead fish from the Old Noarlunga area!!)Old Noarlunga has forever and a day operated with septic tanks adding to pollution problems and has only in the last few years finally got a fully reticulated sewage system which has cleaned up the Onka considerably.Now we come to a real polluter, SA Water's River Road sewage settlement Lagoons (good marketing angle calling them romantic sounding Lagoons?)These Lagoons have leached ammonia for years into the Onka and people may remember in some years when the release of excess winter storm water from Mount Bold, combined with a high "King Tide" has seen these Lagoons fully inundated with the resultant sludge ending up in the River and out to the estuary.Thankfully these ponds are now going to be turned into a Bird Sanctuary, sourced with water from the River Road wetlands which will double filter storm-water running into the Onka in the future! (work has already commenced on this Sanctuary now that the site has been handed back to SA Water after the completion of the New Railway Bridge which intersects the Sanctuary.)So, back to our Poster's question, Would you eat fish from the Onka River?You decide, I know that Jopro might have second thoughts today tho' I'm certain that in the days of his youth it would definitely be a dodgy proposition ;) Sorry for bleating on so long fellas but the Onka is one of my very strong passions :woohoo:

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I have read all the posts here, now maybe the upper reaches are a bit worse for wear with poo ponds /lagoons ect but as tony has said things are getting better ,how metro meats were allowed to blaitantly pollute the system i have no idea but there gone now anyway ,if we look at the original post this guy wants to know if catching fish near the mouth is ok i say yes ,if the river was that polluted near the mouth dont you think the greenies would be up in arms ,my god there is a major reef not more than 300 m of shore from it ,mate i would eat fish caught near the mouth of the river as the winter gets upon us ill be chasing the salmon trout down there an also swinging the alvey on the beach for the big brothers.

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SHARKBAIT...You can get some larger fish at Perry’s Bend as the water is deeper and mulloway like it there.Plus it has some good tidal movement.Posted ImagePosted Image

Need to get your GPS co-ordinates right mate, Perry's Bend is the BBQ area on River Road where the Onkastompa is held every year ;) Your mark is a very good fishing spot tho' as you very rightly pointed out :clap::clap::clap:
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About 25/30 years ago when that road went in called Perry road.When we said we are going to Perry's bend ,question was “where’s that”.Before google maps or GPS we used the street directory and we said..If you look at the map you’ll see a road called Perry road,now follow that straight across as a straight line and you will see a bend in the river it’s pointed at.That’s Perry’s Bend.If others have moved the location then fair enough.Posted Image

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