Mackeral War

Seen this on the BBC news

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-11062674

Yep,
There was an Icelandic guy and an Irish fishermans rep arguing about the allocation of quotas for mackeral.
That was on rte radio about 2 weeks ago.
Not a lot of happy campers in Eire or GB over the issue........

yes they will blind you with there fiqures and quotas. what i seen in this report was iceland had a huge downfall in there herring season?????you would have to question why???? they told us herrings stocks were plentyful

same old sad story highlighting man's greed. fish out one species to collapse, then move onto another. then when it's gone, move onto another . and as usual the commercial sector will invent multiple reasons as to why the fish stocks have been descimated, never accecpting the most blindingly obvious reason,,, you fished them out . is it just me or does any one else just feel like we're going around in circles

I would really worry about what Iceland will do to its fisheries. For years they were the envy of other European countries with very good seemingly sustainable and well managed fisheries. This changed in late 2008 when their banks hit the wall and the country was looking at bankrupcy. Their answer to get money into the country quickly was to increase thier Cod landings by 30,000 tons per annum. It crashed the price of Cod in europe and did untolled damage to their stocks. Seems now they are looking at other species as well.

Caz

Yes Al is right, the commercial sector big wigs (not your average local commercial fisherman, there is a difference) will never accept the obvious that they "are" over fishing. Moving from one species as the last one becomes uneconomic is termed "fishing down the food chain".

Agencies like BIM doctor the stats by saying that commercial sector turnover is up year on year implying that marine stocks are OK. In the case of Ireland if it was not for nephrops (Dublin Bay Prawns), Mussels, Whelks, and Mackerel, the figures would be c**p.

Mussels are rope cultured (sustainable) or dredged (we will say no more about that). Mackerel are over exploited and we more or less developed the world industry model in exploiting this species. Nephrops are relatively plentiful because their major predator, cod, has been wiped out, and the whelk industry is unregulated and therefore a free for all.

Will all this change? If we want it to and are prepared to speak up and offer realistic alternatives, the answer is yes. It will be a slow process but your grand children should benefit. I believe this and I was not brought up in the last shower, drop us a line.

Prohibit ALL commercial fishing within 15 miles from shore. Make vessels land everything that they catch whether they were targeting the species caught or not. Make dumping fish illegal punishable by confiscation of the vessel. When the fishing quota has been reached the boat must stop fishing. Ban any form of fishing which damages the seabed. Control the seal population around the coastline. Enforce the rules and regulations that are already in place !

The people that can do something about the declining fish stocks won't. There is nothing in it for them. They ask scientists to estimate the sustainable catch figures then multiply it by whatever figure they feel like to arrive at the quota for each year. It is totally unsustainable to have ships lift hundreds of tonnes of fish every time they go to sea but it's going to take a total collapse in fish stocks to end this.

Take a look around the car parks at all the major fishing ports. The folk that own these ships are doing very well and they won't stop untill they don't make any money. It's as simple as that

Why can't they just qouta boats to a price, rather than a weight?
i.e. Your boat is allowed to catch £1m of fish per annum, what you catch is up to yourself. (threatened fish excluded of course). This would completly remove the dumping of, lets say extra coalfish, in order to fill up on haddock, as now everything has a value not decided on the amount you have previously caught. Once your value is met, thats you done for the year.

Just one question.

It's a Mackeral War........
How many people have ever been killed by a Mackeral?

Just one question.

It's a Mackeral War........
How many people have ever been killed by a Mackeral?

with posts like this id have a go

Just one question.

It's a Mackeral War........
How many people have ever been killed by a Mackeral?

4

There was a trawler featured on a Trawlermen repeat a few weeks back. This thing in one load caught 400 tonnes of mackerel.So much that they were using a vacuum pump to transfer from the net to hold.

If I recall,this particular brand new trawler was scottish owned. IMO Before authorities kick up over foreign fishers they should maybe deal with fishing closer to home in a prompt manor.

Edit:

Episode 4: The fourth episode of Trawlermen 2 was first shown on Thursday 21 June at 7pm. The largest trawler in the Scottish fishing fleet was featured. It was the Chris Andra and this was its first trip. The Chris Andra (FR 228) cost £12 million with bridge equipment such as sonar and navigation costing half a million pounds. It was skippered by cousins William (Willie) Tait and Peter Tait. The Chris Andra has an 8000 horse power engine and fishes for mackerel off the Coast of Shetland. The ship engineer was Bruce Buchan, a dab hand at playing the banjo. Crew quarters looked luxurious compared to the small bunks of the other trawlermen. They were like small hotel rooms with en suite showers and satellite television. They even had a chef, Lewis Duffy, who was trained in top hotels. His galley was more like a fully equipped five star hotel kitchen and even had walk in fridges and freezers.

In just one haul the Chris Andra caught 500 tonnes of fish which was worth about £300,000.

http://www.trawlerphotos.co.uk/gallery/ ... hoto=49934

and another thing to remember too is how many "BAD" hauls of that size are sampled and dumped back into the sea because they do'nt meet the criteria of size and quality that they are looking for before they get a "GOOD" haul worth keeping frightening ammounts of tonneage of fish left floating for the gulls to george themselves on .

and another thing to remember too is how many "BAD" hauls of that size are sampled and dumped back into the sea because they do'nt meet the criteria of size and quality that they are looking for before they get a "GOOD" haul worth keeping frightening ammounts of tonneage of fish left floating for the gulls to george themselves on .

Good point