The comm "by-catch" that has been going on for years up and down the coast has always been more or less dismissed as insignificant, but they really have no idea of the magnitude. IMO, at a minimum, this tonnage needs to be accurately estimated and deducted from the comm limit. If you did this there would be no comm limit, in fact they may actually have to put fish back... Can you imagine 50" fish floating belly up. Torpedo their boat.
How can a "managed fishery" claim they know what they are doing only to find out that the fishery is "overfished" after many years of their "management"? (case in point herring) IMO this should NEVER happen, ever, and EVERYONE at the DMF on up the chain who was connected with this should loose their job because of it. I am serious about this.
MA DMF (as well as other states) is a complete and utter failure IMO. Everything they attempt to "manage" turns out to be eventually overfished, does more harm then good, regs make little common sense, and are so skewed towards protecting the comm fishermans livelyhood that it ignores all else. Eventually this is going to backfire (in their face) and I think the day is closer then they realize. If you get this on film, it will be one more nail in their coffin.
Good thing they are protecting the dogfish though eh?
oke:
Given the FACTS of their crack job they are doing with herring, WHY ARE THEY FISHING FOR STILL THEM? Ans. Because they are greedy idiots, that want to catch all they can now before any regs go into effect. Why is this allowed?
They will fish those breeder cod until (again) they crush every last one if they could. LEAVE THE
BREADERS ALONE! This fishery is another example of a complete failure. The number of cod that use to be around here "back in the day" dwarfs todays amounts. And it has been "managed" for 20 years.
You may think this is extreme but IMO a lot of comm fishing needs to be shut down altogether for at least 10 years.
You want to fix the problems....do this:
NO GILL NETTING WHATSOEVER
No comm fishing inside bays, sounds and within 5 miles of any coast.
No comm Bass, Cod, winter and summer flounder, tog, Weakfish, herring, (and several others) fishing until the situation hits record amounts.
Regulate so the indv fishery and their forage are PROTECTED from EVER being overfished.
All boats must have inspectors on board.
No dumping of any dead fish. Everything dead must be brought in and accounted for.
Hybrid Mode
