Bass conservation poll - support for closed season

[Huan]

How it works is that you can set gill nets no problem but you cannot land bass.
Dead or alive they have to be returned to the sea, this means that fisherman are not going to waste their time catching and dealing with something that cannot be sold or landed.

 

[paddythefrog]

I would support it but sadly the reality is that there is no way this will get EU wide approval and eventually happen. Not to mention that those dates usually represent the first catches of the season for many a fisherman here, whether they have spearguns, rods or nets.

 

[ADM]

It's a difficult one is the Bass conservation issue. We have tried here in Guernsey to get something done and a great effort has been made by many to stop the commercial slaughter. The big problem is that the commercials here whinge about the bass being a life saver in the winter months which were traditionally very poor until about 3 years back when a breeding fishery was discovered in the high winter seas off Guernsey west coast. They have since been hammered by commercials on rid and line and with nets when posible (there is a 0.5NM netting ban in place around the reef).

The issue is the recreational anglers are also fishing there and the commercials argue about this as well as everything else.

The best support I think spearos can give is to continue to be selective in your catch of Bass, and other species for that matter, and show support in public of what you believe in, be it no bass takes or just selective ones with own bag limits.

Bag limits for anglers and spearos is not a path I want to see taken without a serious and reflective "attack"on commercials with harsher and more effective restrictions on them. I do feel though that I would accept a bag limit on anglers and on spearos (I'm only a beginner spearo btw) if something was done to commercials to make any effort of conservation by Joe Bloggs worth while.

if a close season were to be applied, it would have to be specific based on location, may, june here would be pointless as the shoals congregate from december to March, and when I mean shoals I mean they have been seen here over a mile long, half a mile wide and dozens of metres deep, all breeding fish waiting to be scooped up by trawlers once they move outside of the netting banned area...

The support of spearos in any campaign to help Bass would be geatly appreciated and I know many of you already have your own limits etc to do your bit.

Cheers

Andy

 

[Mr. X]

I like the idea of not targeting spawning fish (& crab). A normally conservation-minded scuba diver friend actually suggested today that I go to a particular place in Devon at a particular time to gather breeding crab; seems like an awful idea - I want them to breed unhindered. He was, however, concerned about the spearfishing competition he encountered close up in Devon at the weekend (Teignmouth?) - he seemed to think the fish were probably discarded, I assured him this was not the case & that fish like Wrasse are usually excluded as many folk won't eat them (I believe this is true).

It would be good to have some information published on spawning times - so that we can at least make sensible judgements (the spearos on the forum seem quite responsible). No point killing one bass when, if left for a few weeks, you could end up with tens more.

However, I share Spearo Daves fear/caution about letting the government loose on something like this. Can you imagine the mess (huge costs, complete failure to achieve the goal, major restrictions, red tape, large penalties, prison for soft targets, back room deals, sell outs, croney jobs, tokenism,...).

I like the Irish solution, described by Huan: ban commercial bass fishing completely, after all, we all seem agreed that is the real source of the problems. To go after recreational fishermen is to delude ourselves. A handful of spearos and maybe a few thousand recreational rod fishermen pale into insignificance next to the big commercial fishermen. BUT, it's easy for me to say that. If I was a commercial fisherman, I'd probably have a different perspective. Also, Huan, isn't fish farming environmentally unfriendly and the product often unhealthy (that is the impression I got from earlier discussions, a recent meeting with a former fish farm owner, a recent BBC Countryfile & the Salmon radiation scare the Christmas before last).

An increase in Bass size limits for all fisherman (especially commercial fishermen) might be worthwhile. I am not very good at estimating fish length but can estimate weight fairly well ... even quite light fish can achieve 36cm - esp. if you include the tail fin. I only shoot one fish a day so a bag limit would have little impact on me. However, I would not favour such a low bag limit. Perhaps some higher limit to discourage any would-be "exterminators" or callous excess (what would that be though...4,5,6,7,8,10,12,...?).

 

[Mr. X]

I noticed on a thread for Ireland that there is a closed season for bass from 15 May to 15 June to allow bass to spawn. I find that I frequently catch females during this time that are full of eggs and am really gutted that this fish didn't spawn.

By the way Andy, if you know Bass spawn between those dates & you, understandably, don't like catching them pre-spawn... why are you fishing for them then?! :duh You could always start the ban with "the man in the mirror".

BTW Was the spawning time changed this year by the unusually late Spring weather?

 

[paddythefrog]

My 2c worth. The official regulations on capture size here in France is a minimum of 36cm which is in my opinion -- way too small as they are not spawning yet at this size/stage in their development. They're only just about ready to spawn and do so when they hit approx. 1Kg in size -- 40cm from tip of snout to end of tail with bag limit of 2 per day (in 24hr period), which is what the capture size in Ireland is at present. This ensures the bass has at least had a chance to spawn or has done so.

If the Eu decide to stick with this 36cm capture size then many years further down the road, we are certain to find ourselves in a situation where bass are no longer spawning because they are being caught before they have reached an age of sexual maturity and can breed. This really worries me over the long term and if there is anything I would like to see done about it, it would be to increase the minimum capture size EU wide to 40cm.

If bag limits were to be put into place I think a bag limit of 4 should be plenty for everyone to feed their families and/or friends no? Size dependant of course.

 

[fearthespear]

So we know (and have done for a long time) that the underlying problem lies with overfishing of selected breeding grounds by commercial fishermen. So what can we do about it? Lets have some ideas on how to tackle this. Can the government really be so short sighted?! Can we afford to let this continue. I wish I was intelligent enough to know how to change the situation, or at least make inroads:head ...

 

[foxfish]

Maybe as individuals we can at least raise awareness to our none fishing friends. If we tell as many people as we can under any circumstances that allow, IE at work or dinner parties or in the pub.
It is particularly disturbing for the Guernsey man who can actually see the boats that are destroying the breeding stocks, from the shore! However dont think that we are letting it happen unnoticed.

 

[Huan]

Also, Huan, isn't fish farming environmentally unfriendly and the product often unhealthy (that is the impression I got from earlier discussions, a recent meeting with a former fish farm owner, a recent BBC Countryfile & the Salmon radiation scare the Christmas before last).

I am not convinced by fish farming however Bass is usually farmed in the Med (Greece), I really don't know much about bass farming so I can't comment.

 

[Mr. X]

... Can the government really be so short sighted?! ...

YES! They are short sight most of the time (whatever happened to pension reform? habeous corpus? tough on crime? invasion of Iraq?:mute...). The EU cod quota for this last year is half the entire population of cod :head - the Telegraph had several long, detailed articles on this last year, e.g. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/12/23/ncod23.xml

"EU settles for half measure on cod crisis
... 23/12/2005 ...

The European Union has given fishermen permission to catch half of the present haul of cod in the North Sea next year.

That is despite scientific advice for the fourth consecutive year that catches should be cut to zero to protect stocks from collapse.
...
The EU deal allows a catch of about 23,205 tons of cod, although the total spawning population is estimated at only 41,000 tons, a decline of 2,000 tons since last year. The number caught could far exceed the quota because of the number of fish caught illegally."​

Wonder what it will be this year ...half of what is left?

Once all the cod is gone, there will no longer be any point fishing for cod (as in NE USA) -- unfortunately they will just move onto another species (see earlier in the thread how anchovie fishermen moved onto bass). Easter Island?

The govts. suggested solution a few years ago to introduce rod licences for seafishing was perhaps the worst "solution" I could imagine: totally ineffective, while also requiring additional paperwork, enforcement, punishing the innocent, removing pressure from the real perpetrators. Tokenism & stealth taxing at its worst. Fortunately fishing (a field sport!) is the most popular participant sport in the country & crosses the social spectrum (even then I know somebody who said the classic line "I don't mind paying as long as it is well used" -- well, it never is...the govt. is shipping it abroad faster than you can earn it).:mute

[Sorry, it is pretty hot & humid here at the moment.]