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Originally Posted by Mr. Sandman
As much as I enjoy catching a few each spring, I really don't "need" them. (I need eels more then herring.) What bothers me about this is the comm catch. A couple years ago (like 2 or 3) comm netters offshre had record herring hauls. It just seems to me that the 10 or 12 herring we might take twice a week for a month or two each spring is not really the problem. The comm interest is so greed based that they will, can and have wipe out fish stocks with ease. IMO if they want to shut it down...shut down all fishing for them.
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hear hear......
Lets punish the group that harvests the least numbers of herring. That is just silly.
Lets start by stopping or dramatically slowing the commercial harvest.
Lets enforce the laws and stop the poachers.
Lets cut the take in half for any given day.
Does anyone have the numbers for example.
1. How many pounds of herring are harvested by the recreational fisherman during the entire season?
2. How many pounds of herring are harvested by commercial fisherman during the season?
I know these numbers are probably not available. But I would be willing to bet the shear numbers of river herring by-catch is still higher than the river herring take from recs.
While I am sure I not seeing the whole picture - this seems like penny wise and pound foolish. I think the recs are getting punished because there is not enough rec money spent on lobbying. the commerical guys, boat owners, protein processors, etc have the lobbying money to fight this.
If there are no herring in the runs - I doubt the primary cause is the few fish (if take legally) taken by Recs.