Anglers reeling over EU's sea bass plans

Wednesday 05 November 2014

Locals fishing for sea bass don’t need tackling over the size of their catch according to one of the Island's angling experts.

Environment’s Marine Resources panel meets regularly to discuss introducing bag limits to help protect fish species and the EU plans to impose a one-fish limit and fines for anglers who catch more than one sea bass but the man who runs Mr Fish Ltd says there are bigger fish to fry.

Michael Ward said the EU should be focusing on commercial fishermen and their trawlers instead who have huge catching power and who he says are treating the seas as a “free for all”.

He said: “Targeting anglers is an easy option in my opinion, I agree we all should be responsible for every fish that is taken, and most anglers would also agree, but hitting anglers and not commercials is just laughable and doing very little to the bigger picture.

 “We need to be tackling pair trawlers, inshore netting in nursery areas should be policed more and set nets on beaches and long lines on beaches should be licensed.

“We can’t work out how many bass are being taken if these are not licensed.”

Environment’s Marine & Coastal Zone Officer Greg Morel said the EU restrictions aren't a new concept but everyone fishing for bass is having an impact on the stocks.

He said: “There’s a lot of talk about bass at the moment, it’s a very important species, the stock is under pressure so we need to look at putting in appropriate management – measures that will cover the commercial sector and the recreational sector.

Mr Morel said the subject of introducing bag limits is something that crops up often when the Marine Resources panel meets and there's already protection in place for  local scallops with divers being limited to how many they can take each day.

He said: "If you are just fishing for fun, recreationally, just take what you need, you don’t need to take 20 or 30 home."

Mr Ward said most of the Island's anglers are already looking after the bass and keeping their catch to a minimum or doing catch and release. This year’s winner of the Jersey Shore Bass festival let his 10 lb prizewinner go again. Callum Robertson (pictured above with his catch) caught 16 bass during the festival weekend last month together with his fishing partner Rob Boxall from West Sussex and all of the fish were returned to the sea alive.