So, our options are to do nothing and let the bluefins be fished to extinction or totally ban any kind of fishing.
While this listing may not be the best choice it sure seems to beat the other option. It seems to me as recreational fisherman we would be better off if there were fish out there. It would hurt the people buying and selling these fish and there would still be a market for pirated fish or "scientific studies" but IMHO that would still be better than no fish at all.
It may not stop the Japanese but it would at least slow them down. And not being a racist but why do the Japanese keep popping up with all of these problems from elephants to black bears and whales to tuna?
This may not be a good solution but it sure beats the hell out of doing nothing.
This in effect does nothing.....All it does is restrict legal sales of bft internationally, by those fisherman who played by the rules in the first place, namely the US.
These tuna are targetted by non conforming and pirate nations with no restrictions on catch or sales, true black market trade....Here's a question to put it in perspective:
Has the ban on drug sales stopped the drugs here in the US?
By limiting the very fisherman who we should be looking to to preserve and sustain the fishery, we have cut out the ability of these same fisherman to do just that. This would open the door for further exploitation by the pirates, they will still kill and sell these fish world wide, as long as there is a market. That market is by and large the Japanese houses that sell tuna at outrageous prices. The reason most of our fisherman export their bft is due to the market that exists for a high dollar commodity. Japan still sells whale meat abundantly in their country, despite the rest of the world stopping harvest of ceteceans for many many years...they do not conform to Western ideals, a historical fact. That is why Japan is referenced in this case, not because I am anti-Japanese or anything.
The science points towards the Western stock being pretty stable, although at a historically low level...while the eastern and med stocks are at a critical level and still declining. There are many nations in the med who are not members of ICCAT, and will not be affected adversly in any way. In essence, we are rewarding these same pirates by making the supply far lower than the demand, skyrocketing illegal fish harvested at will......Leading to my next point: US fisherman donning their eye patches and poaching the hell out of these fish because they have to in order to support their families. Far easier for someone to compromise their ethics rather than their morals. They have been killing these fish their entire lives with no issues, now a stupid rule says they cant: What do you think the majority of them will say to that?
NO, I counter all this does is make the situation much worse.
The ramifications economically are staggering should this horrible possibility come to fruition in late march. Typical of American policy, they react instead of plan; we now will have ad-hoc committess and govt. waste trying to figure out how we will bail out the US BFT fleet when it happens.
Still don't see it that way. Seems to me there needs to be international pressure put on the Japanese. Again they seem to be a common thread in a lot of these issues.
Isn't there a domestic market for BFT or does the American fleet make more money selling it to the Japanese and that's the real concern?
I totally agree with knee jerk reactions and bad policies from inept government officials being bad but doing nothing doesn't benefit anyone except the short term interest of commercial fishermen and the Japanese fish market. And no offense but just like the Japanese, commercial fishermen keep coming up as a reoccurring problem. It's very obvious that they cannot or will not think long term.
Maybe CITIES listing and other bad policies suck but doing nothing IMHO sucks worse. Except for the people making money under the current policies.
This in effect does nothing.....All it does is restrict legal sales of bft internationally, by those fisherman who played by the rules in the first place, namely the US.
These tuna are targetted by non conforming and pirate nations with no restrictions on catch or sales, true black market trade....Here's a question to put it in perspective:
Has the ban on drug sales stopped the drugs here in the US?
By limiting the very fisherman who we should be looking to to preserve and sustain the fishery, we have cut out the ability of these same fisherman to do just that. This would open the door for further exploitation by the pirates, they will still kill and sell these fish world wide, as long as there is a market. That market is by and large the Japanese houses that sell tuna at outrageous prices. The reason most of our fisherman export their bft is due to the market that exists for a high dollar commodity. Japan still sells whale meat abundantly in their country, despite the rest of the world stopping harvest of ceteceans for many many years...they do not conform to Western ideals, a historical fact. That is why Japan is referenced in this case, not because I am anti-Japanese or anything.
The science points towards the Western stock being pretty stable, although at a historically low level...while the eastern and med stocks are at a critical level and still declining. There are many nations in the med who are not members of ICCAT, and will not be affected adversly in any way. In essence, we are rewarding these same pirates by making the supply far lower than the demand, skyrocketing illegal fish harvested at will......Leading to my next point: US fisherman donning their eye patches and poaching the hell out of these fish because they have to in order to support their families. Far easier for someone to compromise their ethics rather than their morals. They have been killing these fish their entire lives with no issues, now a stupid rule says they cant: What do you think the majority of them will say to that?
NO, I counter all this does is make the situation much worse.
The ramifications economically are staggering should this horrible possibility come to fruition in late march. Typical of American policy, they react instead of plan; we now will have ad-hoc committess and govt. waste trying to figure out how we will bail out the US BFT fleet when it happens.
Well said Capt!
For those who doubt this listing will have any effect on recreational fisherman you have to look no further than the wolfish. A petiton from the Conservation Law Foundation got NOAA to place the wolfish on a "species of concern list" (not even endangered) and hence beginning 5/01/2010 all wolfish must be "released unharmed" by both commercial and recreational fisherman. Of course this make no sense to anyone who has actually caught a wolfish as it is near impossible to unhook one alive without serious injury to both fish and angler. The end result will be another waste of a fishery resource. In the long run the wolfish will be no better off.
How long therefore do you think it will take NOAA & the US F&W Service to ban recreational fishing whose anglers take thousands of juvenile fish of an "endagered species" In the long run, as a result of a CITES I listing, BFT will suffer more injury through black market fishing and the US & Canada fisherman will pay for the irresponsible actions of eastern/med countries who defied the rulings of previous ICCAT conventions and will continue to do so.
Enjoy the fishing while you can as unfortuantely, time is running out.
We did do something....ICCAT reduced the 2010 Eastern Atlantic quota down about 60% (not including pirating and illegal catch). That was huge. Basically, they are going to make the entire fishery illegal---which it is already. They are not taking measures to stop this. That is the problem.
Now what they're going to do is take the people out of the equation WHO CARE ABOUT THE FISH! The fish that aren't harvested legally will still be caught...this is what is so ridiculous. Those fish will still be sold to Japan. They've already said f-u to the CITES listing. They already buy 80+% of the catch...
__________________ Capt. Rich Antonino
Black Rose Fishing Charters www.blackrosefishing.com We specialize in 1-4 person charters. Tuna on jigging and spinning gear and light tackle cod, haddock, and stripers. Life is short; get out there while you can.
Still don't see it that way. Seems to me there needs to be international pressure put on the Japanese. Again they seem to be a common thread in a lot of these issues.
Isn't there a domestic market for BFT or does the American fleet make more money selling it to the Japanese and that's the real concern?
I totally agree with knee jerk reactions and bad policies from inept government officials being bad but doing nothing doesn't benefit anyone except the short term interest of commercial fishermen and the Japanese fish market. And no offense but just like the Japanese, commercial fishermen keep coming up as a reoccurring problem. It's very obvious that they cannot or will not think long term.
Maybe CITIES listing and other bad policies suck but doing nothing IMHO sucks worse. Except for the people making money under the current policies.
The money trail is not just the commercial fishermen. When you think about how much money is spent recreationally for the thrill of fishing for, not catching and selling, bluefin tuna, the money created is staggering. The fishery in the US is wintertime in North Carolina and from the middle of May until December in our northern waters. Tackle shops exist along the coast and in cyberspace totally and strictly for the purpose of recreational tuna fishing. Do you think you need a $1,000 Stella and $600 Carpenter rod to catch stripers? Does anyone cast $50 plugs at bluefish? No. It's tuna. Who spends $1,500/day to fish for the hope of casting AT a striper. And the hotels, travel agencies, car rentals, restaurants... Every tuna fishing captain in Massachusetts generates, I'd guess, an average of $75,000-$100,000 of revenue to the local economy every year, when you figure everything that goes into a fishing trip and the trickle down theory.
Commercial fishermen only get paid when they catch fish and the trickle-down is much less (but important).
__________________ Capt. Rich Antonino
Black Rose Fishing Charters www.blackrosefishing.com We specialize in 1-4 person charters. Tuna on jigging and spinning gear and light tackle cod, haddock, and stripers. Life is short; get out there while you can.
rich nailed a big point - if you shut down a major fishery there will be so many lives affected from it. And not just guys who either have to choose between being pirates or not fishing - people and towns depend fully or partially on the dollars spent on recreational saltwater fishing.
Those who feel this is good also need to look at the symbyotic relationship of species. In the SE US we are going to close thousands of square miles of habitat to fishing of 73 species to save one, the red snapper. Any fish that co-exists with bluefin will become off limits so you don't accidentally catch one.
This is a shot in the wrong direction, there is very little US market for bluefin. Most people in a restaurant could't tell the difference between various species of commercially caught tuna. These boats will continue to fish and displace pressure on other species. Then what?
Still don't see it your way but why don't we all keep fishing until they're gone and then see how much trickles down. It seems to me you're just assuming that once they're listed there won't be any recreational fishing. To me that's the same as not going fishing because you're assuming you won't catch anything.
I'll concede that all in all our fisheries management sucks and it's mixed in with anti-fishing advocates with a totally different agenda but that doesn't mean something shouldn't be done. Doing nothing doesn't work and closing our fisheries doesn't work but we ought to be doing something in between. If not we'll all keep doing what we're doing until there's nothing left.
You are correct. The first step of the listing will be a ban on exporting, or International Trade of BFT. What that will do to the Commercial BFT fisherman is make it so it is not profitable to fish for them anymore (I find it hard to believe US restaurants will pay $15 a lb. for Bluefin, when they can get YFT for half that and their customers can't taste the difference). So, the Tuna fisherman end up on the unemployment line....
Of course, this causes plenty of recreational fisherman to say "Woohoo! No Commercial Guys! More BFT for us!". But, inevitably the clamp down will come for us as well. The regs will get tightened until we can't fish for them anymore at all. Piping Plover I think was the term Capt. George used!
First off, I dont agree with a CITES listing.
With that being said, The US imports more Bluefin tuna than it exports, yes read that again. So how is it that the Comercial guys are going to loose a job when they can not keep up with our own demands here in the states?
Here are the NOAA figures from 2008:
In 2008 we The USA imported 646 metric tons of Blue Fin Tuna while exporting 197 metric tons.
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