A Nice Catch of Mullet

[barry luxton]

Hello Barry

 

I have fished Berry head as I have most marks around Torbay many times as an angler never as a commercial fisherman.

 

As you say it is very rough ground and it would most likely be a potter hauling pots.

 

As a angler if I was fishing a shore mark and a trawler came with in casting distance I would be baited up ready to cast as close behind him as I could, there would be more fish following feeding on what the trawl net was stirring up than what is being caught in the net, now that is a fact that no angler on here could imagine.

 

 

Hi Wurzel, totally agree with the above, what i don't understand though, what made you move up the coast? Trying very hard to get the misses to agree a move down there. If they don't have restrictions on us of course.

[stavey]

Thanks for that Stavey.

 

At least you point out the mind set of anglers, your comments are realy helping us realize why no compromize could be possible between anglers and commercials and that you lot are enemies, we can draw the line in the sand.

Bring on the licence and bag limits, day tickets, different species day tickets, one rod one hook rules, ban live bait, stop the distruction of worm beds by bait diggers, it's time you uppity anglers had your wings clipped.

 

By the way the only price I can find for mullet at the moment is Billingsgate selling price of £1.70 per Kg

If the fishermen got half that it still makes that catch a very good days work for not much effort or out lay.

Commercial fishermen catch fish that is how we earn our keep, get used to it.

 

Hello wurzel

 

I totaly agree with you now (i would not have in the past) that no compromises are possible between the rsa and commercials, there never was and there is never going to be in the future, you have made this perfectly clear many times in the last few years on this very forum.

 

You may kid a few people localy that you enjoy a bit of angling and to a certain degree you probably do! but ask yourself a question, when you look at a sea fish what is the first thing that comes into your mind? let me answer it for you MONEY!! right? after all its only the natural reaction of all commercial fishermen, you see it on programs on tv like trawlermen and deadliest catch i also see greed, commercial fishermen are very greedy people in there nature they cant help it, it is just the way they are! i am pretty sure that if you were allowed? you would flog the tench and chub you angle for from your local dykes if you had an outlet?

 

You see wurzel i dont expect you to understand where i am coming from or many rsa's and there reps for that matter but you being a commercial fishermen i guess that is understandable.

 

Ps no offence taken i hope with my reference to the word dickheads, i called my young nephew it the other day he seemed to take it in his stride and he is 12 years old, if mature adults cant handle that sort of thing? thats there problem and they should get out more, cheers...............

[ColinW]

Personally speaking, I can quite happily live with bag limits. However, I would expect the same limits to be applied irrespective of whether I choose to fish with a rod and line or a net. For example, if there was a bag limit of two on mullet, then those eight guys in the picture could pick the 16 biggest fish and put the rest back. I believe that is the system applied in parts of the US to protect stripers. Using a net and calling yourself a "professional" fisherman should not entitle you to any more of a public asset than the next man. So, if I was making my living as a small boat fisherman, I'd be careful what I wished for. I imagine the big boat fishermen and the RSAs would have no qualms whatever about some future compromise which results in having all under 10m boats classed as "recreational", however they fish.

[roryh]

Thanks Barry and Wurzel.

 

As things were we assumed that he was fishing as he was steaming back and forth, then we packed in as others more 'experienced' advised us that there would be nothing more caught anytime soon, will be not following the herd like dolly the bloody sheep in future then thanks to the answers.

 

Later in the day she was made up tho as she got a small Pollack from another mark (she was the only one to catch!!) so all was not lost.

 

As far as some other posts are concerned i cannot see the need to acuse a man of greed for persuing his profession, any more than a Farmer is greedy for wanting to produce more beef or you are greedy for wanting your anual pay rise for that matter. This sort of thing is just fueling the fires. As far as i can see both groups will eventually have to make some sort of compromise no matter how much kicking and screaming goes on.

 

By the way i didn't think the £900 per man for the 10 days at sea was bad as someone mentioned the series trawlermen, for 50 times the risk its hardly 50 times the national average wage is it? Wish we'd been on the same sort of wage/risk ratio when i was in the army though!

 

In my own humble opinion, i dont give a monkeys toss for all this handbags at 50 paces lark, we need both groups and the seperate infrastructures which depend on them, we also need a certain amount of sensible conservation or there will eventually be bugger all for us to catch and i for one will not be too impressed if i have to take my kids round showing them where there used to be fish caught, also i would rather not have to go to the chippy for a cat and chips (although this is probably the most use a cat would have been since the invention of the mousetrap) and talk about the fishing fleet we used to have, thinking it's a bit too much like that already!

Edited February 6, 2007 by roryh

[Leon Roskilly]

i would rather not have to go to the chippy for a cat and chips

 

Fear nopt Rory, there are other alternatives being seriously considered.

 

see: http://www.westernmorningnews.co.uk/displa...me=filtersearch

[roryh]

No squidding?!!??!

 

Dont think i know a chippy competent enough to cook the stuff without it turning to rubber.

 

If things are that bad i better tell my Dad to put a guard on his Koi Carp!

[barry luxton]

Thanks Barry and Wurzel.

 

As things were we assumed that he was fishing as he was steaming back and forth, then we packed in as others more 'experienced' advised us that there would be nothing more caught anytime soon, will be not following the herd like dolly the bloody sheep in future then thanks to the answers.

 

Later in the day she was made up tho as she got a small Pollack from another mark (she was the only one to catch!!) so all was not lost.

 

As far as some other posts are concerned i cannot see the need to acuse a man of greed for persuing his profession, any more than a Farmer is greedy for wanting to produce more beef or you are greedy for wanting your anual pay rise for that matter. This sort of thing is just fueling the fires. As far as i can see both groups will eventually have to make some sort of compromise no matter how much kicking and screaming goes on.

 

By the way i didn't think the £900 per man for the 10 days at sea was bad as someone mentioned the series trawlermen, for 50 times the risk its hardly 50 times the national average wage is it? Wish we'd been on the same sort of wage/risk ratio when i was in the army though!

 

 

Well put Roryh, i will go along with what you have posted. Don't agree with the wages bit though. That was for 10 days of good fishing before tax. I appreciate that the job is dangerous as well, mind you so is the building industry, however they should have more than that i think. How much do they get for a bad day?

Edited February 6, 2007 by barry luxton

[roryh]

Well put Roryh, i will go along with what you have posted. Don't agree with the wages bit though. That was for 10 days of good fishing before tax. I appreciate that the job is dangerous as well, mind you so is the building industry, however they should have more than that i think. How much do they get for a bad day?

Am just thinking that the wages although pre tax was even after a fairly short trip without a full hold they were saying when they had to return early for repairs etc, see your point though in that sort of trade a bad day pays nothing does it!

Easy to read £900 for ten days as more than it is though isn't it?

[Cornishman]

Hello, this is my first post. I've visited and read post's on this site for some time. I'm a commercial (whatever that means?) fisherman of 20 yrs with a long family fishing history preceding myself. I have not come on here for a slanging match ,I just want to raise a few facts that many of you have become misled on. As my user name suggest's I apply my trade in the SW . The mullet in question weighed around 3000kilos and ranged from £1.10 to £1.40, at an average of £1.25 the catch would have grossed around £3,750. All involved work so £1,000+ would've been generated for the tax man.

The pair teams fishing the channel at this time of the year catch and dump tons of mullet. The latest shipping fiasco off the Devon/Dorset coast is also likely to pollute millions of gallons of sea water containing mullet ranging from fully grown adult fish to newly fertilised spawn but there nothing like a picture to get the blood boiling.

Got loads more I'd like to write given the time but this will have to do for the moment. As I've said above I'm not after a slanging match just resonable debate and giving the other side of the 'yarn'.

[barry luxton]

So, if I was making my living as a small boat fisherman, I'd be careful what I wished for. I imagine the big boat fishermen and the RSAs would have no qualms whatever about some future compromise which results in having all under 10m boats classed as "recreational", however they fish.

 

What a good point, if the rsa were to be restricted so would everyone else apart from the big boys, there is already laws in place to deal with them, so everyone would be in the same boat, excuse the pun.