OK guys and gals seeing as I myself the infamous Islander is the enemy a commercial guy I figured I'd start a thread for ya to complain about bycatch and waste and all that so maybe some nerd from NMFS or NOAA will read cause untill yall stand next to us " KILLERS " and wasters at meetings stand united and actually fight for whats right your wasting your breath.. YES I AM A COMMERCIAL FISHERMAN LIKE SO MANY OF MY RELATIVES AND ANCESTORS.. BACK TO 1661 BABY WHEN THE BLOCK WAS SETTLED.... But I am sick of people assuming its us WE DONT WANT TO CATCH everything the "green dorks" and government can program ya all to believe anything.. WE USED TO BE THE ENVIROMENTALISTS NOW WE ARE THE ENEMY??? HOW DID THAT HAPPEN??? Why on earth would we want to destroy our lively hood???? come on you all cant be this blind... Seriously see if you can find a copy of a video filmed mostly in POINT JUDITH called TRUTH: FISHING CRISI OR GOVERNMENT MISMANAGMENT and actually watch it you might learn and realize a few things or read Markham Starrs' book Endangered Species: The Commercial Fishermen of Point Judith ... I dont agree with the laws at all I BELIEVE IN REGULATIONS YES BUT LASW THAT SAY WASTE WASTE WASTE.. MAKES NONE OF US HAPPY.. Yet NMFS keeps pushing it so put the blame were it belongs... They have the best in the world hands down scientists YES THEY DO to bad their " Test Equipment is 45 years old and so counter productive that it defeats the test purpose evrytime.. The "yankee 26" research vessel and the " jason danielle" i beliee made side by side tows at one point the research vessel netted 300# OF FISH THE REAL BOAT BEING RUN BY REAL FISHERMAN WITH REAL EQUIPMENT BOATED 3000# SIDE BY SIDE TOWS SAME GROUNDS ...HOW DOES THAT WORK????? THEY DONT WORK WITH US THEY TRY TO DESTROY US PUT YOUR BLAME WERE IT BELONGS PLEASE...
Sorry to all to sound like I am on a soapbox but My family has been fishing proven since 1661 when my ancestor was paid 3.5 acres of land to stay on BI and teach them to fish... I am proud of my heritage and the dying breed we are we aork in some of the worst conditions with the most regulations and we get crapped on by everyone till ya want fish for dinner... then its oh wow that baked stuffed lobster/fluke/flounder/shrimp/ whatever was damn good tonight.. now lets beat on the guys who catch it..

OK, here is 30 seconds of thought between phone calls:

Fisheries Management is broken.

I would have tight restrictions to ensure there is enough fish, but I would not have bycatch. It comes up in the net, it goes to the market, but it counts against all existing quotas. It doesn't loophole out of a quota. Shock, that means much of the comm bass quota would be used up as bycatch from other fisheries.

Work on better science.
Have less hooks in the water.
Probably prevent political lobbying.

Must be sustainable. Stocks in so many species are hurting. The fisheries management MUST work to reverse that. That is the bottom line.

Say what you want about regs because since they were implemented BI has been the place to skirt them. A little island of pirates and black market bonanzas where it is convenient to avoid authorities. Commercial fishermen are generally stereotyped as hardworking that is true,many are second, third or even fourth generation in their trade. However they tend to not be the brightest bulbs who defend their trade as noble despite the fact they will lie and cheat to continue to rape the ocean. Dollars have always been enough incentive for them to sacrifice the oceans bounty and leave it useless for future generations. Good Luck and tight lines but please stop portraying yourself as a victim.If there were no regs you would be mowing lawns or driving a tour bus.

You kill it you sell it or you eat it. Throwing dead fish overboard is waste. You call it bycatch.

[QUOTE=Islander77;748417]

... I dont agree with the laws at all I BELIEVE IN REGULATIONS YES BUT LASW THAT SAY WASTE WASTE WASTE.. MAKES NONE OF US HAPPY.. Yet NMFS keeps pushing it so put the blame were it belongs... QUOTE]

You hit the nail on the head brother. I have many friends who commercial fish & I have nothing against commercial fishing/fisherman. I do have a problem with overcatch/bycatch and waste that is a direct result of stupid rules & laws that actually end up encouraging such practices. :smash:

-STOKES

Yup, the system is broken... but I am a layman when it comes to understanding all the laws and regs, and who answers to what agency. If we as a group want to be effective, we need to be educated as to what is in place, and then how to lobby for change. I only know of one person who is involved enough to educate us as to what hurdles we would face, and that would be our own BasicPatrick. In his signature you will find the following url www.honestbycatch.comm (http://www.honestbycatch.com/).

If the videos of dumping piss you off, don't just rant on the interblab.... Get educated, get organized, and most importantly, get involved.

Well, that's certainly a 1-sided look at the problem. Reality is that if fishermen were not restricted in harvest (quotas, size limits, restricted areas, etc.), whether commercial species or recreational species, they would catch all that they could to maximize profits (commercial) or available food for themselves and their family and friends (recreational). It's called the Tragedy of the Commons, and it has happened in every exploitation of a natural resource, whether trees, fish, bison, turkey, etc.

Say what you want about regs because since they were implemented BI has been the place to skirt them. A little island of pirates and black market bonanzas where it is convenient to avoid authorities. ...If there were no regs you would be mowing lawns or driving a tour bus.

Way below the belt.:1poke:

Well, that's certainly a 1-sided look at the problem. Reality is that if fishermen were not restricted in harvest (quotas, size limits, restricted areas, etc.), whether commercial species or recreational species, they would catch all that they could to maximize profits (commercial) or available food for themselves and their family and friends (recreational). It's called the Tragedy of the Commons, and it has happened in every exploitation of a natural resource, whether trees, fish, bison, turkey, etc.


Great retort. Truly.

Considering the fact that the commercial fishing industry has annihilated every species it's targeted, I don't know why anyone would be expected to be sympathetic to its current plight. And I'm tired of hearing about "harvests." You harvest what you plant. We're talking about exploitation, not farming. Seems to me that when the commercial fishing crowd can come up with a believable explanation as to what's happened to the once healthy populations of cod, pollock, whiting, bluefin tuna, swordfish, river herring, menhaden, winter flounder, summer flounder, mackerel, etc., then perhaps they'll find a few more sympathetic ears when they're arguing for an opportunity to finish the job on the striped bass population.

Considering the fact that the commercial fishing industry has annihilated every species it's targeted, I don't know why anyone would be expected to be sympathetic to its current plight. And I'm tired of hearing about "harvests." You harvest what you plant. We're talking about exploitation, not farming. Seems to me that when the commercial fishing crowd can come up with a believable explanation as to what's happened to the once healthy populations of cod, pollock, whiting, bluefin tuna, swordfish, river herring, menhaden, winter flounder, summer flounder, mackerel, etc., then perhaps they'll find a few more sympathetic ears when they're arguing for an opportunity to finish the job on the striped bass population.

:claps:

Throwing dead fish over the side has got to be the dumbest thing ever to come out of fishery management. I think that if a boat goes over it's limit or there is by-catch the boat should be required to bring the fish in. The money from the sale of these fish will be turned over to either fund research or enforcement. The poundage will be deducted from the commercial catch quota for that state. Now you have given them a real reason to avoid by-catch and going over there limit.

sorry ... can't read all those caps ..

Woody well below the belt I agree... How bout I start insulting peoples homes???? And as far as waste and annaihalating stocks ok every guy that keeps shorts and over limits IN THE REC feild do just as much damage but hey what do i know.... You can keep blaming us the commercial guys that FOLLOW THE LAW all we can do...

AND SEA DANGLES ... Say what you want about regs because since they were implemented BI has been the place to skirt them. A little island of pirates and black market bonanzas where it is convenient to avoid authorities. ...If there were no regs you would be mowing lawns or driving a tour bus.

1) UMMM all fish landed there???? not in many many years try it gets landed in POINT JUDITH and 2 as far as that goes the only Black market guy you describe came from NY Montauck to be exact and pushed the big sell me your fish for cash back in the day... Avoid authorities yea like dem and audoboun society who are there frequently... Mowing lawns yea I do that too to help out my grandfather with his accounts from time to time... Oh wait as do some of my relatives still do... Dont start talking unless you know the facts man... I dont throw remarks about from where your from...

If you all cant see reality then sorry for you wait and see when the corparations take it over and there REALLY is no fish left...

AND yes I am one of many many fisherman that support the Ideals of if ti comes up it should be going against a quota and go to market... I really wish some of you all knew facts first hand then from what your being spoon fed... But good luck fishing when big business takes over and really truly does " rape the sea" for everything and leaves it for dead....

"Bycatch" by definition is the catching of a difeerent species or species of fish then what your target fish is....

"Waste" by reality is being told to dump good fish thats dead over once it come up on deck ,

We dont try for waste we end up with bycatch, if you cant understand that then thats sad

New regulations starting May 1st are going to seriously reduce the amount of groundfish discards while at sea. Boats won't be required to discard that bycatch, they'll be allowed to land it and that poundage is taken out of a total quota. It's part of the new NE shift to Sectors.

Now whether or not sectors will work in the NE ports is a completely different debate... no comment.

Islander, I understand you're pissed, and you have every right to be. But please realize that not all people at noaa/nmfs are "nerds". Some are in management, and make the rules/regs. Others strictly perform research and are devoted towards providing the best possible data for fisheries management. And there's entire divisions of noaa devoted towards working with fishermen to obtain quality data. Some of us are a little more united than you might think :buds:

Throwing dead fish over the side has got to be the dumbest thing ever to come out of fishery management. I think that if a boat goes over it's limit or there is by-catch the boat should be required to bring the fish in. The money from the sale of these fish will be turned over to either fund research or enforcement. The poundage will be deducted from the commercial catch quota for that state. Now you have given them a real reason to avoid by-catch and going over there limit.

Sounds good at first, but if you think about it, it's really a bad idea - much worse than throwing fish overboard.

If the comm can't make money on it, it's unfair to require him to spend money landing fish he can't profit from. I suspect it wouldn't happen.

If you compensate them, you will encourage them to increase by-catch, IOW fish in areas where they'll get lots of it.

Even if you could entice comms to bring this bycatch in without encouraging them to get more, that will penalize the comm that does a good job targeting specific fish and/or put the little guys out of business. Imagine what happens to the price and quota of striped bass when a couple herring trawlers bring in 20,000# of bass. Price plummets, quota is reached early and the hook and line guys are out of business.

www.honestbycatch.comm (http://www.HonestByCatch.com) is still up and running however within the next couple weeks we will be lauching a new and improved web site, a facebook page, a monthly e-newsletter and an action alert email network.

I also will be taking HonestByCatch.com on the road at the MSBA and RISAA shows and other events as yet undetermined. I will also bring presentations to fishing clubs etc that request them.

It's time we all got together and stood up and cleaned up some of the piss poor regulations.

Managers must be forced to make regulations that protect fish and sustain a realistic commercial and recreational harvest.

Commercial fishers can not have it both ways. You can not battle against the development of reasonable regulations and then complain that you are digusted by the waste caused by the regulations you helped water down.

Also, the term commercial fishers is too broad a stroke. There are good and bad in all fisheries, including recreational and rod and reel commercial. We are entering a time when the good need to kick the bad right out of the fisheries or face the consequences of getting in bed with rulebreakers.

On January 20th the National Marine Fisheries Service Enforcement Division sent a Lettter to the New England Fisheries Managment Council reporting that over the past 30 months they have taken action against 11 vessels and 5 dealers in the Atlantic Herring Fleet for many many violations including "non reporting" of "approximately 23,491,000 pounds" (yes that is millions) and "failing to retain Haddock by catch at sea". The fines totaled $1,100,100.00 and some cases have not yet been resolved.

When the CHOIR coalition was working with enviros to get money for more monitoring of these boats, Atlantic Herring Lobbyists were following them into the same DC offices lobbying against the money but standing at fisheries management meetings claiming they want to work with managers to improve by catch.

It is time for the bad guys in the fleet to go. To quote a movie I sas the other night...."We're Gona Get a Little Bloody On This One".

Support the organizations fighting for your fish...Join MSBA

New regulations starting May 1st are going to seriously reduce the amount of groundfish discards while at sea. Boats won't be required to discard that bycatch, they'll be allowed to land it and that poundage is taken out of a total quota. It's part of the new NE shift to Sectors.

Now whether or not sectors will work in the NE ports is a completely different debate... no comment.

Islander, I understand you're pissed, and you have every right to be. But please realize that not all people at noaa/nmfs are "nerds". Some are in management, and make the rules/regs. Others strictly perform research and are devoted towards providing the best possible data for fisheries management. And there's entire divisions of noaa devoted towards working with fishermen to obtain quality data. Some of us are a little more united than you might think :buds:

Jack you are correct not all are nerds... and if your that united tell them to get a real net please so their test instruments are real... And yes sector will change things dramatically WE HOPE if they can do better math that is lol.... the biggest draw back to sector so far seems to be leaning towards vessel size and not landing history to determine it from what I have been hearing but here is hoping to a brighter future...

Sounds good at first, but if you think about it, it's really a bad idea - much worse than throwing fish overboard.

If the comm can't make money on it, it's unfair to require him to spend money landing fish he can't profit from. I suspect it wouldn't happen.

If you compensate them, you will encourage them to increase by-catch, IOW fish in areas where they'll get lots of it.

Even if you could entice comms to bring this bycatch in without encouraging them to get more, that will penalize the comm that does a good job targeting specific fish and/or put the little guys out of business. Imagine what happens to the price and quota of striped bass when a couple herring trawlers bring in 20,000# of bass. Price plummets, quota is reached early and the hook and line guys are out of business.

So you think it's a good idea to throw 20,000 pounds of dead fish over the side. That holding up the price of fish is more important then wasting fish. That it is more important to keep the quota available for commercial fisherman then it is to waste 20,000 pounds of fish.

Why is it unfair to require them to bring in the fish. They're given the privilege to fish for a public resource. We need to give them more reasons to avoid areas where there is a higher risk of by-catch. Let peer pressure within the commercial fishery fight out the issue and come up with answers. If they're caught throw dead fish over board then fine them and take their permit away. Sure you won't catch them all but it's better than nothing.

Right now there is no reason why they shouldn't fish high risk methods and areas. Just throw them over board, all I want is the money.

I've read post saying they're just a fish the fines shouldn't be large or put them at risk of losing their job. I work in an industry where if I falsify data they will pull your license and you will not be able to work in the industry for 5-years. What this really means is you will never work in the industry again. Plus the regulator can press criminal charges. So I don't have much sympathy.

I've read post saying they're just a fish the fines shouldn't be large or put them at risk of losing their job. I work in an industry where if I falsify data they will pull your license and you will not be able to work in the industry for 5-years. What this really means is you will never work in the industry again. Plus the regulator can press criminal charges. So I don't have much sympathy.

Worked 5 years as an EMT, onto Per Diem status now. Thought about becoming a medic as a career but the liability is far too high, risks too high and compensation too low. Had to deal with exactly what you talk about above - false or missing data on a run report (even if unintentional) at the very least could mean losing your certs, at the worst could mean losing your assets like your house and garnished wages from losing a negligence claim.

I agree with you. It's tough to sympathize for people complaining about getting fined and the possible outcomes of steep fines. Don't break the rules, and you won't have to worry too much. To reword an old corny phrase, "Don't do the crime, if you can't pay the fine."

Just in other businesses, the crooks ruin it for everyone else.

the biggest draw back to sector so far seems to be leaning towards vessel size and not landing history to determine it from what I have been hearing but here is hoping to a brighter future...

sector based fishing quotas will based on catch history of the vessel not vessel size. Boats who have been sitting at port or have not been active for the past few years are going to get screwed. The guy who is really going to get screwed is the captain who wants to buy another boat with poor landings, even though he has been doing well on his current boat.

sector based fishing quotas will based on catch history of the vessel not vessel size. Boats who have been sitting at port or have not been active for the past few years are going to get screwed. The guy who is really going to get screwed is the captain who wants to buy another boat with poor landings, even though he has been doing well on his current boat.


Isn't that scenario a little like feeling bad for a guy who insists on buying a Toyota Dealership or a typewriter service company in the next year. The commercial fishing buisness will never again be what it was and the fleet is going to shrink. Ecosystem based management plans are coming and far less people will be catching the same amount of fish just so that regulatory discards are converted to sellable product. This is a fact. Buy a boat and get what you deserve right now.

Take a look at the food industry in general.. It is dominated by huge corperations. There are only a small handfull of slaughter houses that deal with all of the beef and pork in this country. The stage has now been set for the corperate take over of the ocean. With sector based qouta system, catch shares can be bought and sold. This means that the gorton fisherman can buy out all the qoutas in point Judith for his factory ship..
There will be a lot of good fishermen looking for a new jig when the owner of his boat sells his allotted share to get out of the debt he has found himself in.
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

Take a look at the food industry in general.. It is dominated by huge corperations. There are only a small handfull of slaughter houses that deal with all of the beef and pork in this country. The stage has now been set for the corperate take over of the ocean. With sector based qouta system, catch shares can be bought and sold. This means that the gorton fisherman can buy out all the qoutas in point Judith for his factory ship..
There will be a lot of good fishermen looking for a new jig when the owner of his boat sells his allotted share to get out of the debt he has found himself in.
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

Yes thats the thing Eben and folks the sector thing is assigning quotas on the limited landings people have been allowed for the last couple years they need to go back and look to see who landed what before the 0 pound a day stuff took affect to make it fair... And for the record its a lot harder to sell your days or quotas then you think with new laws they make it very hard to do this with the new laws in place.. To wit if you buy a boat with permits you HAVE to fish for a solid year before you can swap permits to another boat... just FYI

Yes thats the thing Eben and folks the sector thing is assigning quotas on the limited landings people have been allowed for the last couple years they need to go back and look to see who landed what before the 0 pound a day stuff took affect to make it fair... And for the record its a lot harder to sell your days or quotas then you think with new laws they make it very hard to do this with the new laws in place.. To wit if you buy a boat with permits you HAVE to fish for a solid year before you can swap permits to another boat... just FYI

The proble with wanting to go back to when everone had a lot more historical landings is that we can not harvest that much fish anymore. Those older landings amounted to monstrous overfishgin by the fleet. The years of going 100, 200 and over 256 % over the Gul of Maine and Georges Bank Cod Quotas are the teeth in the ass of every commercial groundfishermen today. Not to mention that while all the commercial groups were beating the %$%$%$%$ out of the council over the scallop decision a couple weeks ago none of those commercial groups were paying attention to the number of yellowtail quota they were actively giving to the scallop fleet. I guess when a sector gets shut down because they cant get any more yellowtail quota it will be the council's fault and not the fault that they backed the wrong pony in the scallop issue.

Bottom line is everyone wants less discards but when the only plan that turns it all into sellable catch means that a lot of guys are going to go out of business then we go straight back to how the regulators suck and don't know what they are talking about.

Like it or not overfishing is ending. Dumping and wasting fish is ending. IT surely sucks but the fleets must consolidate in order to maintain some viable businesses.

The days of take a buyout and use that money to buy into another fishery even though you signed a paper that you were getting out of the industry are teh bottom teeth in the ass of the traditional commercial fisherman. It's surely not pretty and I think it is horrible that the injustices of yesteryear are punishing today's fishermen but bottom line is to clean the mess and fix 30 years of mistakes ehre is goign to be some pain. I feel bad for what I see but that is the way it is.

WOW Basic I wasnt saying th eover fished landings not at all I was saying look at the boats landings and use that along with a math formula to figure new alllowed quota for boat... does that make sence to you.. Not ok we cut you way back so this is what your getting lol make it fair the guys on bigger boats with bigger expenses that land fish should get bigger piece you know.. stopping discard has to happen, it just has to

Jack you are correct not all are nerds... and if your that united tell them to get a real net please so their test instruments are real... And yes sector will change things dramatically WE HOPE if they can do better math that is lol.... the biggest draw back to sector so far seems to be leaning towards vessel size and not landing history to determine it from what I have been hearing but here is hoping to a brighter future...

Nets aren't a problem. If you've been out fishing for haddock on GB, you know it's common for ~10 boats to be fishing right in the same area, and one boat hits the 10,000lb school while the rest get nada. That's just the way it goes sometimes. There's so many different versions of that story (research vessel was towing with no doors, net was full of holes that weren't mended, etc etc) out there.

The movement now needs to go towards cooperative research- using commercial fishing vessels to obtain catch data (in addition to survey and observer data). That, along with the development of new trawls (or gillnets, or dredges, etc) that reduce bycatch are going to be the future of the northeast fisheries.

So you think it's a good idea to throw 20,000 pounds of dead fish over the side.

No, I think we need a better answer than what you proposed. I don't buy your premise that your's is the only possible alternative.

No, I think we need a better answer than what you proposed. I don't buy your premise that your's is the only possible alternative.

Then what is your "better answer"?

Obviously you agree there is a problem. So what would your solution be?

Man I feel bad for the new england commercial fisherman.. here is a glimpse of what is coming... from an Alaskan crab fisheries point of view-

The Last Frontier on Vimeo (http://vimeo.com/8645375)

Eben, Basic And the rest of you that talk nets this that... SIG HANSEN said it best in that video the data collected needs to be used and they NEED to talk to fishermen see what we see and then use it not collect let it sit in a box for 5 years.. By then its to late for the enviroment and every one else.. AS FAR AS THE NETS GO.... The net they use has a HORRID gore on it..( Gore: Were the top and bottom meshes of net come together) Which is proven in a test tank video.. If you have 108 meshes on bottom YOU HAVE TO HAVE 108 on to not 98... the gor on that net looks like this ^^^^^^^ not --------- reality whatch a video LEARN something see what we see here in RI FISHERIES and then talk or go back to the eco-freak calender selling mega non profit organazations that have taught you all what horrible people we are... But just remember the way this country is going your all damning your major protien suppliers FARMERS AND FISHERMAN....

And JAckk I am sorry but the yankee 86 boat her net is crap.. The tow when ever they get there you dont get fluke yellow tail or squid at night.. But the show up off the island and its drag a net now even if its dark.. the observers one of which will be on my boat this trip need to KNOW WHAT FISH IS WHAT I mean seriously come on now you report what fish come up and you dont know what is what????