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Andy Rowe

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Re: Official Ambassador for Southern Oman
June 11, 2013, 12:22:25 PM
Ed, firstly a big congratulations on your award, truly well deserved.

Secondly, the tag concept will be ground braking. I love the concept of some really good science on this matter and will support it. Hopefully it will answer some of the mysteries to this tremendous and unique sport fish. How long will the tags record once placed?

BRAVO!!!!
Set the ray to GeeT

Bertrand Picarda

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Re: Official Ambassador for Southern Oman
June 11, 2013, 06:25:17 PM
Sat tagging looks very interesting, my only concern is would the tag stay attached to the fish long enough ? We have all experienced the infamous reefing after hook up so am curious to see how a GT would react with something attached to its back ? Would it try to rub it off on some rocks ? Spearfishing friends and divers have told me many times seeing GTs furiously forcing they ways into narrow gulleys and caves to eat crawfish, crabs or an escaping small fish. Due to the nature and behaviour of GTs am very curious to see if sat tagging would work. I am supporting the idea for sure.
All other succesful taggings are happening on pelagic species and open water swimming fish, am not aware of any sat tagging done on what could considered as a reef fish.
It would be great to be able to tag a large GT in Oman just before they tend to "disappear" and find out where they go.
Recapture rate is probaly higher than we think. 2 years ago I caught a few decent fish on the islands that had recent hook marks, I cannot tell 100% if these were caused by my own lure or if these were fresh from a recent capture.
Anyway well done for this great idea and I hope you are able to implement a sat tagging program. The whole GT community will benefit from it.
Cheers.

Andrew Smith

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Re: Official Ambassador for Southern Oman
June 12, 2013, 10:33:59 AM
Fantastic news regarding the satellite tagging Ed! That is a sensational effort to get something like this off the ground. Our research institutions spend years and LOTS of currency getting tagging programs in place, let alone sat tagging and tracking. Look forward to seeing the results and hope the fundraising goes well. I have some aussie dollars set aside for your program!

Ed Nicholas

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Re: Official Ambassador for Southern Oman
June 12, 2013, 03:43:45 PM
Thanks for the encouragement and support, it really is exciting to be launching the Sat Tag programme and i know there will be some very interested Anglers looking at the results.

When i first set up our current programme we had a fair amount of negative feedback and speculation but the interest seems to be growing now. With all the other tagging projects in place for various species it seemed like a no brainer to try and gather info on the baddest mo fo' on the reef.

We are ordering sPAT Tags which essentially are pop up tags. They thankfully do not have to be retrieved and detach themselves after 30 days where upon hitting the surface transmit all the information gathered - Depths, Temp and also location. The tag will also detach itself should the fish kick the bucket and not survive which would be a terrible waste of one of these awesome computers but would support some theories on death upon release.

Bertrand you are right most tagging projects have been focused on pelalgics but then according to some experienced guys these monster GT may very well cross open Ocean on the currents/trenches etc .. they def go somewhere! I will be looking to tag only a couple of true monster fish hopefully at the end of November and then right at the seasons end (close of April). The tags are not too cumbersome and hopefully wont annoy the fish enough to try rub them off, it may happen but hell we have to try! 

I will start a new thread on this so the topic is only about GT tagging and conservation and not about No Boundaries. I would be very happy to hear thoughts and comments from all and put the nonsense politics aside for a worthy cause.

Once i have set up the fundraising account i will share all that info and even the smallest donation will be big help in sourcing the needed kit.

Tight lines Ed

Haron Khaliq

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Re: Official Ambassador for Southern Oman
June 12, 2013, 10:20:58 PM
Should record the process from day 1 and make it into a documentary.

*thumbs up*

David Noble

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Re: Official Ambassador for Southern Oman
June 14, 2013, 09:28:31 AM
Congrats Ed & well deserved.
Good luck with the sat tags I'm sure plenty of anglers interested in this one.

Cheers Dave

Sam Colvin

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Re: Official Ambassador for Southern Oman
June 14, 2013, 04:51:24 PM
Congrats Ed.

You sure do run a great operation, and a sustainable one at that
Cheers,
Sam