Quote Originally Posted by porgy75 View Post
"Most watermen are honest, and that will weed out the watermen who aren't. I say get rid of the bad apples and we'll get our respect back," Webster says.
I agree, most watermen are honest. The bad ones bring a black cloud of notoriety over the whole community, though. More guys who do this for a living need to realize this and help with leads to guys they know are bad. The reality is that these are close-knit communities where everyone knows everyone else's business. The honest guys have to have leads or suspicions of who the main players are in the poaching game. People who work in the business go to bars, hang out with each other, some get drunk, and secrets are spilled. IMO anyone part of that community who has been around for awhile would be able to help the CO's. The question is....Will they help them prosecute the bad guys?

The reality is that the number of cases where they discover guys doing this is much smaller than the actual poaching going on. Someone suggested with illegally discovered catches counting toward the yearly total, this might prompt better cooperation among comm watermen in those areas. I hope so.

to all the guys at DFG/DFW who continue to do their job prosecuting these guys despite the high odds against successful conviction.