Two Men Arrested In Connection with Illegal Landing and Sale of Striped Bass

[FishTwoO]

Originally Posted by choggieman

prolly more like 4000.00 and to pay for it he'll have to fish a coupla extra days... word is he made 25 times the fine selling fish this year..so a 4% loss to a fine with no other repercussions makes good business sense to keep doin it...... love how the law makes it a reality.
worse part is that he is just one of dozens who do the same thing, poaching on a comm. license. All the guys that do multiple trips per day, killing their 5 each trip, they are selling them somewhere too. I have seen the same boat go in and out of the river with the guys limit over and over day after day.
how many guys catch their fish in r.i. and run them to mass? I know a couple who do. Best excuse i have heard is that " I only do it when I need drinking money". that is without a comm license, so someone somewhere is buyin those fish totally illegally. Lots and lots of "black market" unregulated poaching, buying and selling goin on
it is impossible to regulate, make em a gamefish and be done with it. No poaching if there is no market for ther fish

It's common practice when RI commercial season closes and MASS opens the RI guys don't change fishing grounds they just change where they bring the fish.They do hold MASS licenses.The mentality is the fine won't make a dent in the profits and the odds of getting caught are slim to none.

[Mike P]

Originally Posted by FishTwoO

It's common practice when RI commercial season closes and MASS opens the RI guys don't change fishing grounds they just change where they bring the fish.They do hold MASS licenses.The mentality is the fine won't make a dent in the profits and the odds of getting caught are slim to none.

Just goes to show you what kind of chumps we are here. Our DMF knows this is happening, and yet makes the license and bass endorsement available to any out of stater who wants one, for less than the cost of one day's fuel.

IMO if your state won't grant a Mass resident a commercial license (either because they're grandfathered like Rhody, or you're in a gamefish state like CT, NH and Maine), you shouldn't be able to get one here.

Not that those RI fish were going to migrate up here anyway, but it's just the principle of it. But if you take 200,000 lbs of RI fish out of the market, our season lasts a couple of weeks longer

[ivanputski]

I get pissed off when I see people keep every single SCUP they catch at the east wall... never mind taking 42 bass!!! Im sure he's never done ANYTHING like this before... first time... just made a bad mistake...

[choggieman]

Originally Posted by ivanputski

I get pissed off when I see people keep every single SCUP they catch at the east wall... never mind taking 42 bass!!! Im sure he's never done ANYTHING like this before... first time... just made a bad mistake...

I bet the fine he gets thats this was not a one time thing and that he has been doing it for a long long summer. Like a hundred+ days straight doing multiple trips....