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True Tales of the Trout Cod:
Murrumbidgee Catchment History

We were fishing over in the irrigation canal and we caught this bream, it had big white eyes. My uncle said “that’s a Macquarie perch”. We caught one another day in the Murrumbidgee itself. My uncle said they were plentiful in the river in the early days, I haven’t seen one since, that was in the ’40s when we got them.

– Jim Bailey 2008.

Stocking the Barren Jack Dams

Letter to the Editor, Sydney Morning Herald, 10 March 1915

“Sir, – A short time since a paragraph appeared in the “Herald” re stocking the dams at Barren Jack with economic fish, ie cod, perch etc. A request was sent to the Fishery Department to take the matter in hand, and an expert was detailed to carry out the suggestion. This expert’s idea was to capture fish in the reaches of the Lower Murrumbidgee, and transplant them to the said dam. Instead of so doing it will be far better to permit the dams to be stocked by or with the fish that are in thousands above the dam.

They are precisely of the same species as will be obtained from the stretches of the same river lower down. The young fish that are in the waters above the dams will be sure to make for the deeper waters: it is their natural habitat – the larger and deeper the waterholes in rivers the larger its fish inhabitants.”
-Cooma Fishermen

Download the booklet

Learn more about the history of the Murrumbidgee River with the beautiful PDF booklet filled with stories, maps and fabulous old photos. You can get a copy the full booklet here for a donation of $5.