South Aussies have stepped up for local wildlife over the weekend, with a further 1,500 banned opera house nets collected at a community swap.
Green Adelaide Director Brenton Grear said the net swap event provided a win-win-win. It gave recreational fishers an opportunity to swap nets for a more wildlife-friendly alternative, stopped the use of problematic nets, and ensured old nets will get recycled.
“Removing these harmful nets allows air-breathing aquatic animals such as rakali, also known as the native water rat, and turtles the freedom to thrive in Adelaide’s rivers,” Mr Grear said.
“We know these animals can get trapped and drown in these outdated, enclosed style nets.
“So, we replaced the illegal opera house nets with wildlife-safe pyramid ones, which have an open top to allow these animals to easily escape if accidentally caught.
“This is our third opera house net swap event, bringing the total number of nets collected across metropolitan South Australia to nearly 5,000 — a big win for the health of our rivers!” Mr Grear said.
Green Adelaide partnered with RecFish SA to run the events with previous events held in 2023 and 2024.
Opera house nets were banned in South Australia from 1 July 2023, but continue to pose a serious risk to native wildlife when discarded or forgotten in creeks and rivers.
This event supports our rewilding project to reintroduce platypus to the River Torrens / Karrawirra Pari. Learn more about this project.