I'll post the page of the link that Fin was referrring to. It's a lot more graphic when you associate a pic of a dead drum with that link.
There's one thing I want to make people aware of on commercial fishing. I don't expect everyone to agree, that's why we live in the US. Everyone's entitled to their opinion. There are different methods of commercial fishing. The draggers and roller draggers do the most damage. Do a search if you don't believe me.
I would put bunker netters in that category, even though I believe they use the purse seine method. Please help me to correct any inaccuracies if you have the specific info.
The gillnetters are the least damaging. A problem arises when gillnetters use net sizes other than statute allows, or if they target species they should not be catching.
I think there's a thread on here about this somewhere. I'll have to do a search when I get a chance. Or maybe a member can help me by doing that search.
My point: There are all types of commercial fishing. I think we as concerned fishermen need to know about them and the specifics.
In any event, any method that leaves big dead fish lying on the surface is something that should be looked at. We should all try to educate ourselves as to what the alternatives are.
The full page:
http://www.saltwatercatch.com/photos...e-lookout.html
Exclusive! Photos of the dead red drum at Cape Lookout
By Bill Hitchcock
On Wednesday June 3, 2009 I had the great pleasure of fishing with
Captain George Beckwith of
Down East Guide Service out of Morehead City, NC. We started the day by site casting to cobia that was swimming underneath the Beaufort Inlet sea buoys. Live eels and a variety of soft plastics were used. After several hook ups, releases and landings of cobia and amberjack we decided to scoot on out to Cape Lookout Shoals. It was a beautiful, calm day so peering into the water for fish was not a problem. It’s especially not on Captain Beckwith’s boat. He installed a second level or tuna tower above his center console on his Parker Boat. This elevates him another 8 feet or so off the deck giving him a bird’s eye view of what’s swimming in the water.
And boy did we get an eye full.
There were plenty of sharks, a small school of Hatteras blues and even a couple of tarpon spotted. But nothing seemed to be attracted to the soft plastics we were throwing out at them. So Captain suggested we run north a bit along
Core Banks to see what we could find. Unfortunately what we found wasn’t a pretty sight.
George sited it first; A single red drum (or redfish) floating dead in the water. Both of us were aware that menhaden fishing vessels from Omega Protein of Reedville, Virginia had been in the area. There had been eye witness accounts from two days prior of a fish spill. According to the
Carteret News Times, “Fishing Vessel (F/V) Tangier Island had split a net and spilled about 150,000 dead fish about two miles off Cape Lookout.”
Later that same day several recreational fishermen reported that the Fishing Vessel (F/V) Lancaster, also with
Omega Protein, was setting on a school of menhaden very close to shore where they were cobia fishing. The pictures of the dead drum you see here were taken while I was fishing with Captain Beckwith two days later. We counted over
60 large red drum floating dead just off shore of Core Banks. The fish were similar in size to what NCDMF recovered.
Most of these drum were found floating by themselves along a tide line. The fish were spaced apart from each other on average of approximately 4-500 yards. The tuna tower on the captains’ boat, the calm water conditions and bright sunny skies were instrumental in our ability to spot all of the drum that we did. If we didn’t have the advantage of the tower or the weather had been bad we would have never seen all of the fish we did.
The impact of the event isn’t as dramatic or traumatic when you only see one fish at a time. It would have been quite a different picture if all the fish were grouped together. But the dead fish count was still the same regardless of the grouping and should in no way lessen the significance of what happened.
And speaking of which-What exactly did happened? Did these menhaden boats accidently set on a school of drum? Were these drum all mixed in with the menhaden only to be discarded later as by-catch? And I wonder how many drum in total they actually set on? Hopefully we’ll find out very soon. And if a crime occurred then Omega Protein should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. It’s important to note that this fish spill and kill occurred at a very opportune time. Currently there is a bill in the
North Carolina General Assembly (HB 1344) short titled, “Prohibit Taking of Menhaden for Reduction“. HB 1344 would ban the taking of menhaden in state waters for the purpose of reduction including “conversion to fish meal, oil, and other components”. The act does not apply to “the taking of menhaden for use as bait for commercial or recreational purposes”.
Having out of state menhaden vessels fish the waters of North Carolina and kill, as by-catch, scores of red drum, North Carolina’s official state fish is a sure fire way to get HB 1344 passed. This was a very tragic event and as far as I know a very isolated event. I hope cooler heads prevail and that all crimes are punished. So what do you think about what happened?
Note: If you would like to learn more about red drum, their biology, life cycle, migration, catch & release techniques and more-Then watch the half hour television documentary,
“North Carolina Red Drum”
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