THE LAW

does anyone know the law reguarding how far fom shore a boat is allowed to towe for fish?i witnessed a boat towing very close to portrush harbour on sunday night,he was no more than a mile from the harbour ,he then lifted the net and proceded to one of the beaches close by and proceded to tow for fish again,can this be legal????he certainly has stuffed the fishing up there at the moment and it was fishing fairly well.cheers john

the usual suspect i presume?! that guy has constantly damaged our beaches up the north coast, we seriously need someone to put a stop to it! 8) :twisted:

Not sure about your area, but here in Kent vessels under 17 metres are allowed to tow as close to the shore as they can get.

The regulations will differ from place to place, so you need to check with your local inshore enforcement authority.

See: [url]http://www.anglers-net.co.uk/sacn/ireland/[/url]

(Foreign vessels are not allowed inside 6 miles, and only those with 'traditional' fishery rights inside 6-12 miles).

Tight Lines - leon

thanks leon this guy is a local and the boat about 30 ft.i think it is a disgrace he is allowed to wreck the shore angling the way he does.towing the same place about 12 hours apart,what damage is he doing to the small fish and sea bed.it really gets on my wick.!!!!!!!

"There doesn't appear to be any limit on how close in any boat can work gear, the limiting factor seems to be having enough water to float the boat.

This is going on all around the coast, day and night. In the Republic, there was supposed to be a sort of ""gentlemen's agreement"" that trawlers would not trawl inside headlands i.e. leave the smaller bays alone.

However, greedy and unscrupulous skippers have often come very close inshore to trawl - seeing these areas as 'having had a wee rest'.

Another common excuse is that 'it was a bit lumpy out, so we had to work in near the shelter of the land'.

With the spiraling cost of fuel, I'm sure we'll see a lot more boats working ever closer to shore to save on diesel money, although the Minister for the Marine is I gather under serious pressure from the commercial fishing lobby to provide some for of monetary relief for the fishing fleet to compensate for the fuel price. Perhaps I can apply for something similar for petrol for my car....

I've been an advocate of no netting (static or towed) inside a 3-5 mile limit for years. I know the damage done by fishing gear both to the fish stocks and the marine environment.

I don't want to see commercial fishing abolished, but I do believe that our national catching capacity has to be severely scaled back to remove pressure on the remaining fish stocks in our waters.

I'm also all for a proper system being put in place to protect our waters from exploitation by other nations. If half the money that has been squandered on the fishing industry since 1970 had been put into developing a proper, dedicated fishery protection service, fish stocks here would be far less trouble than they are now. We have a sad history of boom and bust fisheries and allowing the rest of Europe to come in and basically do whatever they want in terms of fishing.

What's needed is some form of legally enforceable areas where commercial (and perhaps recreational) fishing effort is limited if not completely banned. But that's a whole other issue....."

Deleted

Unfortunately in our capitalistic society we live with unfettered greed. We take too much from the earth and give nothing back. Whether it is fish, wood, rain forests etc. we pillage the planet to support a world population that is too large for the world and one day it may possibly go bang in a big way. Hope not.

Those trawlers that fish too close to shore now because of diesel prices will be doing exactly what in 20 or 30 years when there is precious diesel left? What will they do if inshore fish stocks go beyond repair? People in general do not look to the future. It's a now mentality.

I have no ideas on figures but my guess is that one good trawler will take more fish from the sea in a year than all anglers combined so we are not the main culprits but we do want to defend our sport.

Now is the time for us to act and not sit around waiting for direction like our elected representatives. They will not make an unpopular decision for fear of upsetting an established industry - whether that industry is for our good or not. You cannot fight an established lobby like the trawlermen because the word "livelihoods" and "business" come into it. Look at the noise they make now about having scallop quotas cut. Blockade Rosslare port was their answer. Those quotas are cut for a reason and are a halfway measure between protecting stocks and appeasing the fishing lobby not proper quotas. Part of the problem is that there is no way out for these trawlermen....if they were given a suitable compensation package things would be different?

Why does BASS fishing not get banned for eternity in nursery areas? It's simple, effective but too difficult to enforce most likely. We need enforceable laws not laws designed to make lawyers a good living.

I'm all for the Trawlermen, don't get me wrong but we are doing to our fish what the Brazilians are doing to their rainforests. And this is the problem...we want them to leave the rainforests alone but what if they were to say to us "Don't overfish the sea". I can see Pat Gallagher choking back his Pie & Chips reading that in the paper!

Anyway rant over - not wanting to antagonise anyone but there is a BIG picture not to be hidden by a load of little ones!

yea well we cant be relying on the law - but the sentiments are good quarterflounder

as always in these situations plenty of problems identified - i only wish there were solutions :(

should check out a recent article in new scientist about deep sea fishing - nets that are 250km long!!! and being left down for up to 3 days - with only 30 - 40% of the catch usable for human consumption

this is mental stuff - and the nets are continually left on the bottom when caught or snagged to keep killing :x

like you said tho - rant over

Hi corbyeire,

Which edition was that in? Wouldn't mind a look at it.

I'm in a bit of a poacher/gamekeeper situation here given that I worked for the guts of 2 years on a small trawler.
Bottom line lads is that inshore "between the headlands" trawling is standard practice. Most boats are smart enough not to do it within view of the villages or whatever but it happens.
The catches from this type of trawling in terms of fish are probably lower in volume than further out to sea but all the fish taken are premium fish such as plaice, megrim etc. I would argue that the fish taken is not the problam but the amount of damage done in terms of sea bed erosion and food removal. Mindblowing the amount of reef/coral and small crab, shrimp, blenny etc that would come up in the nets.

Both the CFB and the Minister's for Marine's office have declined to comment on the trawling inside headlands issue.

im a bit of an eejit in that it was nature not new scientist!

http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050926/ ... 926-1.html

hope this link works

:D

"Works fine, thanks. On a link off that page, see

http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050926/ ... 926-7.html

Note caption on top photo on page.

Like he said in Jaws ""We're gonna need a bigger boat""!"

the bigger boat may not be the problem - no catch for 3 seasons could be the real killer - even for the most dedicated of us!

Re: Both the CFB and the Minister's for Marine's office have declined to comment on the trawling inside headlands issue.

So what are we paying these for....to sit on a headland watrhing a nice dredger pulling the bottom to bits whils supping champagne from the cooler in the black limo!

On a seperate note is there any legalities on the distances you can set a gill net from the shore? This weekend at Wicklow I watched a guy on a boat attach one end of his net to the actual pier!

Dont have a clue but JESUS! attached to the pier....................

I don't think it would matter if it carried the death penalty - there is just no enforcement of the laws we know we have.

I don't believe there's any limit to how close inshore you can set a gill net - or any net, for that matter.

I'd report it anyway. The netter is probably after bass or sea trout, so there's a no-no and in addition, if the net is obstructing safe acces to the pier, report for that as well - try the harbourmaster or coast guard.

Hi, as soon as I saw that bit of info above on Wicklow pier I typed up some emails and a letter to say/report what was happening but now I'm a bit stuck .... who do I send them to? :shock:

For me this incident shows something, previously I wasn't much bothered about writing letters to Pat "the cope" et all them, I did send a few emails allright ( 6 ) but not much/enough. Now that it has happened at "my spot" I'm fairly angry I did'nt do more earlier. :x Unfortunately it took something like this until I actually put in the propper effort and I will ensure I keep it up for the future.

But being 16 so a non-voter I doubt I will be listened to
(as usual - recieved no reply to mails I sent before).
This pier holds nothing of real size unless you know exactly where to look. This is the only fishing spot I know well and it does hold lots of small fish but these can be quickly wiped out with a net along with the few larger fish.

Viper do you know which pier it was on, The older one (south, I think) is the better for fishing but the other one holds more flatties including plaice ( but not during winter).
Also would it not be v. dangerous here if it got caught in one of the snags as it's used for swimming sometimes.
Thanks for any help and info on who to let know ( is there anyone ).
All the best.

If you think you have witnessed someone fishing illegally or poaching you should contact the local Regional Fisheries Board HQ as soon as you can.

Eastern Regional Fisheries Board. Tel: +353 1 2787022
Southern Regional Fisheries Board. Tel: +353 52 23624
South Western Regional Fisheries Board. Tel: +353 26 41221
Shannon Regional Fisheries Board. Tel: +353 61 300238
Western Regional Fisheries Board. Tel: +353 91 563118
North Western Regional Fisheries Board. Tel: +353 96 22623
Northern Regional Fisheries Board. Tel: +353 71 9851435


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