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Originally Posted by RIROCKHOUND
My sense (DZ, #^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&, Fisheye might have a different opinion) is that nothing will happen THIS season. I think it is clear to ASMFC that the public comments favor a closure/ban on the elver/glass eel fishery, since obviously alot more eels are killed per pound and at a vital life stage.
The way the timelines work, UNLESS they go with a USFW Endangered route or take emergency action, it will be a year before any formal action is taken by ASMFC. I think we have eels for now, BUT if it comes out to ban the glass eel fishery, please support that. Also if it comes up, several people wanted to look at the amounts of eels exported vs kept in the US.
It was also commented that when compared to the glass eel fishery the recreational and bait take may and probably is much smaller
FYI for an idea of what goes on see
http://northeasteelcompany.homestead.com/eelpage.html
Based on their numbers, if they harvesy 500kg of glass eels, then thats approx 2.5 MILLION baby eels.
And Spence: Bite me you overgrown cornhusker  ... my plugs catch fish.... as do my eels.. something you witnessed a night in Oct where I think you got the skunk.. hmm |
I agree, I left there feeling good. Looks like there may be a ban on the glass eel fishery, tighter regulation as to "reporting catch" which was aimed at the harvesters and vendors themselves. I didnt leave there feeling that they are going onto the endagered species list.
Hanging around and BSing with the guy , his gut feeling was no endagered species,He mentioned to me that they never did that with Sturgeon and that fish was in much worse shape than the american eel !
I also want to see whats right but, it seems to me and it was pointed out last night numerous times, That the export of eels for food is about 95% versus the bait sector which only accounts for 3 to 5 % of the total numbers.
Bottom line? I see no loss of eels this year and tighter restrictions on them in the future but, my gut tells me eel fisherman will be bangin bass for the foreseeable future.........
He also pointed out that this would not affect "farm raised eels". I think those that are panicking can relax some. They still need to collect tons of data and thats going to take time.