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| Here are this week's Dirty Dozen Draggers placed here to celebrate the NPFMC's failure to control waste in the GOA. In the right column is the percentage of halibut PSC as compared to the catch. Ironically the Alaska Beauty is the dirtiest dragger this week with fully 43 percent of their 'cod catch' halibut PSC. No reasonable country or state would tolerate this kind of resource waste. Other draggers on this list show they can control their PSC, at least some of the time. Source. We will publish the NPFMC motion and vote when it becomes available. |
http://www.fakr.noaa.gov/2011/car120_goa.pdf
104 X 2200 = 228,800 pounds of halibut wasted by draggers just last week. Value? In cash terms to longliners, about one million six hundred thousand dollars ($1,601,600). In lost reproductive potential, in lost growth potential, in long term resource damage; all unknowns...but far in excess of the cash value lost. All in one week. Are we sure that is the full extent of the damage? Not at all, as the observer program is badly flawed. Well what about the report that just came out show that Alaska's bycatch was so much lower than the rest of the country? Totally misleading and released in a timely way to bolster dragger arguments before the NPFMC that they are so good and righteous...but the fact is that the bycatch in Alaska is a great unknown due to the misleading character of the posits in the extrapolations of a badly flawed observer system. Wouldn't you think the media in Alaska would examine this stuff? Wouldn't you think they might look deeper than a feel good press release by NMFS? Why would they? There is no more reward for real investigative journalism than for the embrace of press releases, that you don't have to rewrite for a public which remains largely uninformed. The preceding article here regarding faulty red king crab science is an indication of how easily twisted the shaky science is in institutions where uncomfortable findings are suppressed and independent thinking scientists are marginalized.
KYFW,
14 comments:
Yup....they went cod fishing and got some beaautiful numbers. Mostly in the 10-20% halibut range. These numbers can be attributed to their limited fishing time, less days to go fishing causing them to take an observer on a REAL cod trip.
At the same time (last week) they went Arrowtooth fishing, where they scooped up a nice chunk of halibut. The funny thing about their arrowtooth fishing is that they only made a handful of tows, less than they did with the observer on while cod fishing. They aren't limited in their arrowtooth fishing so they can play the observer games out and select when and where to tow. Hard to believe they only killed 100 or so tons when you see the numbers in the 15-20% range.
the npfmc just made the trawlers $1OOm more by voting "no action" on halibut bycatch. every time a good suggestion was made the council members would react negatively to the proposal and it's presenter.
the longer they stall taking action to actually reduce bycatch,the more money the trawler owners make.
stall,stall,stall.... keep trawlers happy.
the truth still stands
How many tows did they make?
4 out of 16 aint bad
any word on the rumor about the Michelle Rene cutting loose their net so the observer couldn't see the bag stuffed with tanner crab?
while some boats didn't catch a lot of cod and therefore had a high percentage of halibut, some were able to catch cod with a low bycatch rate. no mention here of the cod longliners fishing with an average rate of 25%, a high of 46%. will be curious to see how much halibut is thrown away by ifq fisherman when they have to take observers. easy to point fingers.
They didn't have a high percentage of cod because: a) they kept their tows short because of the observer, or b) they were in a high halibut area, or, c) you say so. Bottom line is that dragger secrecy works against them because as the general public becomes aware of the manipulation of required observed trips, the suspicions about what these figures mean becomes more damning. Honest people don't have to hide their activities. More information will damn or exonerate, depending on real behavior. Best practice? Come clean.
More information will damn or exonerate, depending on real behavior. You're correct there, more observer info will come in the next couple of years from non-trawl fisheries and we can watch you try to defend your dirty long-line pals.
Keep making it difficult for us to live in Kodiak and maybe we'll all sell to Trident and fleet consolidation will follow. How will that go, ya think?
@ 9:18 You should know you can't speak logically to the illogical.
Don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.
What difference does it make whether trident owns the boats or not? last I checked there was only 1 boat out of the 16 listed that is owned by trident. That has absolutely nothing to do with whether the observer coverage is adequate enough or games are being played. If increased observer coverage is going to be a factor in keeping your business or not somethings going on.
Not all bycatch is equal. While it is true longliners have halibut bycatch, through required careful release practices and a pro active approach by industry, the DMR(Discard Mortality Rate)shows the majority of our release live to be caught another day. Trawl bycatch is dumped with majority to feed the crab.
F#cking draggers. You're killing us small boat fishermen. And you that were towing inside 3 miles at 2:00 am on the mainland several weeks ago, I gave NMFS your name and number and they're watching you.
Why not put cameras on all boats? that will show what really happens. Make it a requirement that every fish you bring on board must be on video and logged.
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