Vacuum dredging for cockles???

There is a rumour going round that there are plans afoot to dredge Tramore and Woodstown for cockles.
Has anybody got any definite information, I would be very interested.
Tim.

what affect would this have on the fishlife?

i cant imagine it being any good for the ecosystem - too much disruption

:evil: :evil: :evil: :evil:
I have heard about this and am appalled at the thought of it. This is a nursery area and is full with tiny fish. I have seen countless species here in the earliest stages of life (bass included).
To go in and vacuum fish this area is going to have a detrimental effect on the area and beyond.
I am asking anybody with an interest in the sea to voice there opinion on this here and help to stop it. If it starts here it wont be long before it is fished out and they will move to your area.
How can we stop this :?:

Couple of rubbish posts removed.... Lads this is a serious issue so try and be constructive. You wont change anything with stuff like that.

Unbelieveable!!

That area is awash with all kinds of Wildlife Birds Fish Worms etc..

I have sent off emails to Birdwatch Irl and the CFB to see if they were aware of this.

thats shockin.. would completely destroy the sea bed and everything that lives off it..

i am disgusted reading this i used to go picking cockle's there as a kid with my dad.if they clean the place out what effect would it have on the sea life and wildlife.im sure i was told that they done the same thing there a few years ago with the sand eels my dad recons the place has never been the same since why do these people find that money is more important than the future of our sea life :twisted:

There has to be something we can do to prevent them sucking the bottom dry????

simular thing happened in cahore with the welks, and there are several boats in dublin sucking the bottom, so its not really a new thing

Lads

Someone needs to find out who is proposing to do this first of all. Then find out if they are registered fishermen/boat. Even if they are registered and because this I presume is an intertidal area we are talking about,(where cockles live) we need to find out if they have a foreshore licence from the dept of marine. The section of the dept to find out from is the coastal zone admistration dept (CZAD) which used to be based in leeson lane but I hear they may now be based in clonakilty.

Other avenues that might be useful is local conservation ranger with Dept of environment. He might be able to check out if an environmental impact statement is needed (at least 30,000 eu) before fishing is allowed.

Hope this helps

Caz

At the risk of being epically unpopular;

If there are cockles there which are not currently being targetted then I think we should all be surprised it has taken this long for them to be picked up. If there is a natural resource and there is demand for it, it will be exploited.

Secondly this will definitely have a detrimental affect of aspects of the system. Certainly if certain species rely on the cockles (do they?) they will struggle if there are no more cockles undoubtedly.

Thirdly from experience fishing for shellfish there are 3 main methods. Potting, Drag bags and Hoovering. DragBags are infinitely worse than hoovering in terms of damaging, indeed decimating the surrounding area. If the cockles are to be commercially fished, hoovering is the lesser of two evils (doesn't make it good though)

if the sea bed is hoovered would the sea bed that has been disturbed wash away in the next big tide and if it does what effect will it have on the established wildlife, such as the fish and birds that depend on finding food in the same areas, because the sea bed will become flat and featureless and when the slit/sand/ mud have washed away then all that will be left is stones. Now if the sea bed is altered and there is nothing to slow the charge of the sea then coastal erosion will increase and this will have a knock on effect on other areas of the coast with more sediment deposited on other shore lines changing that area too, sorry for the rant but i have seen the effect of mans disregard for the sea before and how it effects more than just one area

Lads, I was involved in dredging for razor fish in the late nineties. Thankfully I have not depended on fishing for an income for a good few years.
The situation was that fishermen often rigged up often old decommisoned trawlers for Razor/cockle dredging in the nineties. In the intervening years the government introduced a bivalve[another name for cockles, razors.etc] register and issued these boats with bivalve licences. These boats are only allowed to fish for bivalve species,but they fish where ever they want.
The dredging is very damaging to the sea bed, as it kills and collects everything on the sea bed and down to two feet below it. We used to break more cockles and razors than we would collect.
My own local area Dundalk Bay, has long been cleaned out by trawlers, and now the sea bed itself has been destroyed by these dredgers. They came from all around the coast to dredge here and now boats from this area are dredging bays, sounds and inlets on the south and west coasts.
It really is a terrible situation. Short boom and a very long bust, just like most commercial fisheries.
Mark

This is a disgrace!!! What action can we take to prevent his? <modedit> This is disgusting,Tramore wil lnever be the same again :evil:

on 2 occasions large dregers/hoveres tryed for biovalves in dungarvan bay, which is just up the road from tramore.
thankfully they soon left the bay, not enough fish i suppose,with luck tramore will be the same..

This is a natural resourse which has been in the area for a long time, but the damage done by the hoovering method will take all the small fish and fry from the area which is the life blood of the spawning ground. One question I have is, is this a conservation area, was there a ban put on jet skis there a few years ago because of the bird life, geese flock there in large numbers and they are protected. There are also large numbers of winkles in the area which will be destroyed. Now that the dump has been closed and is being covered by the council the water quality should improve immensly and if anything so should the fishing in the area including Tramore Beach. This can not be left go ahead as it will be a caatastrophie

Hi,
At the end of the day, unless you get a TD in election mode, there will be nothing done, though i have to say the drift net fishermen showed that you can turn a TD's descision.!
The post regarding checking licences etc is a good direction to go, and IF a green minister for the area can be brought onboard then the enviromental impact study would certainly delay the attack for a while.
As already said though, as its out of sight to the general public, ( ie underwater)not enougth people will care what happens.
Just one other point that could be raised. Raw sewage is poured into the river at crooke,and as we know tramore bay, god only knows who is going to eat these shellfish when they sell them!!! E-coli city!!!
regards
screeming

the area is uncovered at low water and has a lot of people use it (bait diggers,cockle pickers dog walkers,bird watchers ect....)so it in every ones interested to stop it.it is all been keep very quite ,i think it should be made knowing to everyone.as said it will change sand movements ,what effect will this have on the sand duns witch the council is spending money on to preserve???it is a breading ground for countless numbers of fish,worms crabs marine plants ect....protected birds like the brent geese witch fly here in winter to feed on eel grass what happens when the grass is gone.one of the few places the egerat bread and they feed on small fish.it is not only us as anglers that will be effected.if it goes ahead the area will be cleaned out in months.

Voice your opinion on european maritime policy here http://www.mwg.utvinternet.com/
We have a chance to have our say on how we think our seas should be used.
All of us get angry or upset by what we see happening in our fisheries but how many of us forget about it and let it slide as we know the resourses arent there to deal with it.As anglers we have a powerfull voice if we use it,there is enough of us to be noticed and I think that we should just speak up
a little.The 30 of june is the closing date for submissins on the Green paper,there is still time to reply with our ideas.