undersize fish

[ecoli]

for the past few weeks there has been a fellow fisherman (of orientel origin) sharing my local mark . now I havent got a problem with that what p***ses me off is that no matter what size fish he catches he keeps . I have spoken to him and he spoke good english but today when he killed a under size codling I tried to explain that it was not legal size he sudenly could not understand english packed up and left with two bags full of fish . what can you do ? (short of chucking him in the tyne ) My dad just says to let it go but it is starting to iritate me any Ideas lads

 

[mickcave83]

i know the feeling m8, theres an old man gets on the roundhead at roker, his excuse pot bait, now some of these fish are only about 8inches long. but what really gets my back up is alot of the locals who are pals with him also give him there undersized fish too, so ya can imagine what its like when ya have them days when ya getin flooded off under size coalies, or and listin to this it gets even better, i thought he had a boat with a good few pots but he aint, he has 4 which only get put out down whitburn by wadeing in the sea on big tides

 

[willywetegg]

If you want to do something about these people, here are a couple of phone numbers for you.

North of the Tyne. Defra North 01670731399

South of the Tyne. Defra South 01482339690

Not sure if they work a weekend though but the information might just get followed up one day you just never know. Even if it just makes you feel better, give them a ring.

Jim.

 

[ecoli]

cheers Ive saved them to my phone

 

[treeboa]

similar happens on merseyside mate, bait collecting beds are destroyed with the `yellow peril`clams razors the lot get hammered, fisheries guy cant do anything as they speak `pigdin english` and say its for thier own use, even though you see it on good low waters like a day out with not a few but families of them , lots of them towing modded 10 gallon containers, in your case undersize will get acted upon if caught, when i reported some ****e that was gill netting within 200 yards of a bass beach in wales they wanted reg details, description and pics if i had them, get as much evidence as you can mate

ok a deep hooked undersize you do get occasionally and i have no problems in it going for the dog or the cat, but when its anything and everything being kept then i do have problems

 

[Red5]

Treeboa, we get a lot of people coming up from the town in the Summer to Boulmer for Lobsters and Edible Crab. I'd been down on a big tide with a bait pump to try and get some black lug 3 years back, when some big fat fella from the town stopped me back at the car park and asked what the fishing was like up here....'Diabolical I says' (I always do) and I looked down at his white bucket in which he had 4 lobsters which were not much bigger than Longustines.
Going back to the licencing situation, maybe if they employed enforcement officers who could be on call 24hrs a day (bit like the emergency services) to act upon those people who think it's their god given right to take what they want.

 

[KeithB]

ok a deep hooked undersize you do get occasionally and i have no problems in it going for the dog or the cat, but when its anything and everything being kept then i do have problems

That's still illegal, even if it's dead it's gotta go back.

 

[insanojackson]

Defra do get out and about, about 12 years ago i had a few bass at cambois, I got stopped on the way back to the car by someone from defra and he measured all of my fish to see if they were size (which of course they were)

 

[treeboa]

red5, when i have seen this the local fisheries officer has been there hurtling around on his quad, i had a go at him about it when he wanted to check what i had, which was precious little as they had devastated the bank, he said when they tell me its for personal consumption i cant do jack about it, even though i see them sometimes daily, ok if anything is undersized then he can act, however when you ask who they are etc and all you get back is jabbering that you dont understand what do you do ?, as he said they did a big hit a few months before, fisheries, imigration and the dhss, but as he then said a week later they are back at it again because they scream racial equality and everyone treads carefully, i also freshwater fish, you hear stories about e.u imigrants who dont have an e.a licience yet catch and take home anything, we do the same and we would end up with a massive fine, seems our home country no longer belongs to the english

 

[eddie t]

If i get a undersize fish and it is well hook and can not get the hook out and it is dead i just thorw it back whats the point of keeping a fish when you cant get nowt off it all undersize fish sound be thorw back.

 

[bronson]

for the past few weeks there has been a fellow fisherman (of orientel origin) sharing my local mark . now I havent got a problem with that what p***ses me off is that no matter what size fish he catches he keeps . I have spoken to him and he spoke good english but today when he killed a under size codling I tried to explain that it was not legal size he sudenly could not understand english packed up and left with two bags full of fish . what can you do ? (short of chucking him in the tyne ) My dad just says to let it go but it is starting to iritate me any Ideas lads

it might be hes making fish soup or sumit

 

[mick dunn]

In Spain its a similar thing. The spaniards keep everything. When i was in Benidorm last year i was fishing off the rocks watching the locals. They had the big water bottles with a hole cut in and filled with sea water. Very small fish were kept and put in.They soon died but were kept fresh by the cold seawater. Must use them for piella.

 

[davem2005]

Intresting post...

The problem of contacting a fisheries officer came up via one of the members here just yesterday.

The numbers Jim posted are in fact office numbers and if you phone them between 9-5 monday to friday someone will answer. The numbers are for the Sea Fishery Committee offices who are responsible for enforcing size limits.

The Northumberland sfc covers North Shields to Berwick.

The NE SFC covers South sheilds to Donna Nook ( Hull for those with no map )

So first lets look at the NESFC. If you look at their website the contact numbers for their enforcement officers are here.

North East Sea Fisheries Committee - Current Bylaws

Choose the one covering the area you are concerned about and ring him. Give him as much detail as possible and give yourself a pat on the back.

Now lets look at the Northumbria SFC. The website is here

Northumberland Sea Fisheries Committee

The ONLY contact number is the one given earlier by Jim 01670 731399 which is the office number and manned as such. Lets hope that any offences you witness happen during office hours.

But it gets worse.

A member of this forum contacted me about what he considered to be a serious breach of the NSFC bylaws but did not know what to do about it. I rang the above number and asked for the contact number for the fisheries officer responsible for the northern region ( the area is split into three each with a seperate officer but only one patrol boat)

I was told "We cant give out numbers, but if you leave your name and number someone will ring you back". Which I did and the lady recognised me as a member of the committee and someone phone me back very quickly and they are looking into the particular issue I raised.

The point here is that both those committees are funded in the same way and that is by a levy on the local councils, which means you the council tax payers are funding it. One committee seems to be happy for the public to contact them the other would seem to be making it as difficult as possible for people to contact them.

Its encouraging that anglers are prepared to do something about people blatantly breaking size limits and to quote the fisheries officer I spoke to yesterday.

"Its nice to know that there are many sets of eyes on the beaches keeping an eye out for possible law breakers"

To which I replied:-

" A fat lot of good it does if they then can not report those sightings to the relevant people!"

An email is on its way today to the chief executive of the NSFC expressing my concerns and a link will be put in it directly to this post.

Cheers
Dave

 

[willywetegg]

Nice one Dave, it will be interesting to see what sort of reply you get mate. It makes you wonder how two different Committees can do the same job so differently.

Jim.

 

[davem2005]

I am not looking for a pesonal reply on this ...I want it to be discussed at the next SFC meeting.

Which incidentally are open to the public if anyone fancies coming along however you are not allowed to comment except when invited to do so by the chairman.

Cheers
Dave

 

[willywetegg]

Where abouts are they held Dave, I could not possibly promise to attend but if I am feeling good enough to manage it and it is not too far, I would like to give it a go as it would be quite interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes.

Jim.

 

[davem2005]

They are held Quarterly at county hall Morpeth on the third tuesday afternoon of the month.

The next one is in January. Plenty of time for this topic to be added to the agenda.

The meetings usually last a couple of hours depending on the matters to be discussed.

Cheers
Dave

 

[willywetegg]

Cheers Dave, if I feel up to it I will have a look up and meet up with you. It isn't far from Consett so that won't be a problem. If you could send me a PM a bit nearer the time I would appreciate it though, but will make a note and try to remember. I probably won't be able to let you know until the day itself though as I can be not too bad one day and feel lousy the next.

Jim.

 

[loopy]

Dave I would also be interested in that meeting for the reason we have talked about.

Lots of proposed changes for the SFC in the white paper, funding and greater representation from the EA, Natural England in other words committee votes and then this little gem.


7.70 – 7.71: MCS supports the renaming (and associated re-branding) of the SFCs to mark their
functions (paragraph 7.70, pg 110), whilst recognizing that a change in name is only one step in changing the culture of modernized SFCs from the current focus solely on fisheries to a broader remit.

 

[sless]

i got a long winded letter from defra yesterday
out lining their proposals

were getting nowt in exchange for our dough

simple as that