End of the Tope?

[Guest stevie cop]

It's not that we don't want them to catch anything. We just don't want them wiping out anything. It takes Tope so long to grow to the size of the ones we've got now, that if those big fish were wiped out, we'd never see anything like them again in our lifetime.

[sam-cox]

Wurzel,

I make you right, Ive always wanted there to remain a commercial fishery asd Ive earned my living working on commercial fishing boats before.

Ive always been against fish farms as they efect the enviroment and push down the returns a commercial fisherman gets for his catch from market.

Now I hear fish farms a fast becoming enviromentaly friendly.

It is now becoming aparent to me that my farther is right in what hes been sayng for 35 years, that commercial fisherman are a bunch of money grabing [edited - John S]who want to earn all their money today and dont giver a flying F about tommurow, a case of Im alright jack.

The commercial fishing fleet now has to face the fact that angling is worth much more than the whole commercial fleet, and that their days will soon be numbered.

This targeting a non substainable fish , THE TOPE, has tipped the balance for me and I now want the fleet cut even more until we just have very few commercials left, fishing for a stock that is growing, not decreasing.

 

[ 21. June 2005, 12:38 AM: Message edited by: John S ]

[wurzel]

You mean like tope, which are increaseing, er everdently?

 

by the time the anties have finished with you, it will be your days that are numbered.

Anglers are not worth more than the commercail fleet and Ive heard that anglers are decreaseing, and a lot of clubs are struggling to get enough members.

Never did have much respect for your old man.

[Ian Burrett]

wurzel:

You mean like tope, which are increaseing, er everdently?

 

by the time the anties have finished with you, it will be your days that are numbered.

Anglers are not worth more than the commercail fleet and Ive heard that anglers are decreaseing, and a lot of clubs are struggling to get enough members.

Never did have much respect for your old man.

This is a serious issue, worthy of debate. Don't get personal Wurzel

[sam-cox]

Tipical commercial, resort to insults.

 

How many of porpoises you caught this year Wurzel?

 

Working the Gabards, Galloper and Kentish Knock as I know you do your bound to catch a few, the law of averages dictates that.

 

Do you get them out your gear before they are dead? bet they are a right pain all spun up in your gear.

Those cross tide fixed tremels dont miss much do they Wurzel, hundreds of crads and buzzers at times, use a mallet to smash them to a pulp then shake them out do you? and those ruddy little pouting, dabs,gurnards and other small fish that just die in your tremmels and atract zillions opf crabs that mallet realy comes in handy doesnt it.

and how about the protected allis shad, always look like bass when your halling your drift netts, until they are out the water then you realise its a ruddy dead allis shad and have to chuck it back dead.

[sam-cox]

I was told you are a nice guy Wurzel, but opinions vary.

[wurzel]

Being refered to as a money grabing [edited], makes me a bit snarley.

 

As for the tope, in this area (south east) I can't see wot you are all getting het up about, if tope were going to be wiped out they would have been years ago, as I Have said on another thead, fishermen have always caught tope as a by catch while long lining for skate, the only difference is now they will be paid a bit more for them.

With the small amount of boats left in the area the tope are under less threat now than they ever were,

I doubt that many commercial skippers will get excited over a few tope,

 

[ 21. June 2005, 12:39 AM: Message edited by: John S ]

[sam-cox]

my comments were not aimed directly at you Wurzel, Steve Coppello speeks highly of you and thats good enough for me, but slag my Dad off and that gets me a tad narly,

Troose?

I do know that there are a few conservation mined commercial fisherman like my mate Nicky Boyce that Ive worked for, and I was told you are of the same ilk.

[wurzel]

We'll sort the Porpoise and tramell crap out another day

 

Steves been trammell netting with us ask him what unwanted fish we caught.

[sam-cox]

Ive done lots of tremmel netting myself, also drifting for bass and mullet inshore and offshore, I know whats caught. I dont like tremmels when ive crewed for nick when hes been tremmeling the longsand and black deeps we caught lots of unwanted crap.

drift netting for bass only seens to catch sizable bass, we once had 150 stone of bass from the knock, lots of 40 stone hits and several 20 and 30 stone hits, this was 1994, we also had sea trout up to almost 20lb. I did enjoi crewing for Nick and earnt lots of money at times, it can be a lovely way to earn your living, but it needs strict controles.

Ive never seen a dead sea bird or porpoise, seal or dolphine, only lots of dead small fish, buzzers crabs in tremmel netts. i wish i had photographed those good ol days.