Monster pink ling
Crew member Richard Knox couldn’t believe his eyes when this massive pink ling was hauled on board the Petuna Endeavour. The average pink ling is 1m long and weighs less than 10 kg’s. The maximum reported weight for pink ling is 25 kg’s at which time it would be 30 years old. However, the pink ling pictured weighed a whopping 45 kg’s and was 1.74m long. Pink ling live along the southern coast of Australia, from Perth to Port Macquarie including Bass Strait and around Tasmania, in open waters on the continental shelf and upper slopes between 200m and 800m. They occur in other southern hemisphere countries including New Zealand, Argentina and Chile. Many fishermen believe that ling live in burrows when on soft bottom but they are also often associated with canyons. Pink ling is an important commercial species in Australia and are managed under quotas set by the Commonwealth harvest strategy.