Has anyone else noticed sick fish lately? In the last few days I have seen 1) an eeltail catfish rolling upriver along the sand with the tide, with some flesh taken from around the stomach, 2) a small (1m?) wobbygong jammed in rocks about 200m from shore, looking a bit old (going white), with a few nibbles, and 3) the last bream I caught had a rough looking dorsal fin, with a few snapped spines and damage to the webbing.

If you fish anywhere near Gladstone Harbour, you could blame it on the dredging.

Do you fish anywhere near mining or industry?

Maybe there has been a spillage or dumping of toxic waste somewhere or maybe our coastline has become such a garbage tip that the fish can't thrive as well as they used to.

Those fish sound as though they're diseased. We shouldn't be surprised. There have been plenty of warnings over the years that our natural fish supplies are struggling.

Sounds like you're describing the Boyne River.  I was fishing there today. Plenty of healthy whiting, but a lot of snags at the mouth of the river from the floods in January, except that eel-tail catfish are normally found in NSW. I've never seen them in Queensland.

It was in NSW. I have seen them in QLD too, but there seem to be a lot of different types.

Have you been seeing dead fish?

Saw a few more injured bream on Tuesday (QLD this time).

Can't say that I have. If it's the Northern rivers, they have a bad history of disturbed acid sulphate soils. That can result in lesions.