The Great Fish Fight.

Cantona's Collars

Watched an episode of this last night on CH4,it's on all this week.Highlights the waste of tonnes upon tonnes of fish due to crazy EU quotas.
Couldn't help but get angry watching perfectly good cod etc. being thrown overboard,with millions starving in the world why not simply have an intervention scheme or better still scrap the quotas and come up with a new fishery program.

stovelid

I thought it was going to be about giant fish fighting each other.

chin_grin

Give a man a fish...........something something something.

MrStuffins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsfiD78Cy0s

starbelgrade

I got into a fight with a big fish once.

I battered it.

Tiddlypeeps

Are the fish alive when they are thrown back in?

Sanjuro

starbelgrade wrote: »

I got into a fight with a big fish once.

I battered it.

You're codding us.

Lumen

Tiddlypeeps wrote: »

Are the fish alive when they are thrown back in?

No.

chin_grin

Sanjuro wrote: »

You're codding us.

Right time, right plaice.

Tiddlypeeps

Lumen wrote: »

No.

Why would the EU want them to throw dead fish back into the sea?

pickarooney

I thought this was going to be the definitive fishy pun-off thread. Boy was I disapp... oh, wait.

I thought it was going to be this, but with fish instead of tomatoes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPQCH1b_LgE

MrStuffins

pickarooney wrote: »

I thought this was going to be the definitive fishy pun-off thread. Boy was I disapp... oh, wait.

You're talking cobblers!

Guill

I have to say that i am a huge fan of Hugh Fernly whatsitagain. My Dad told me he had a new show on last night so i watched it, when i seen the opening intro it seemd too much like the chicken show he did a few years back. i was going to turn off but the GF said to give it a chance. I was half looking and giving out about how many crusades this guy is going to go on but then GF said ffs look at the fish they are throwing away and dead too! I couldn't believe it! Tons of dead fish thrown away cause of quotas! If the fish are hauled in and dead why dump them? It is actually unbelievable!

SeaFields

Saw this too. It was a good watch. Hugh Fernley Whitingstall was behind it - he had some success in last few years with a campaign to stop intensive chicken breeding in the UK.

For those that dont know, once a trawler reaches its quota for a certain species, it must throw back any more of that species that it catches. And since nets cant discriminate as to what they catch, a lot of dead fish get thrown overboard.

Basically the EU are retarded.

Flimbos

Holy carp, this thread sure beats looking at internet prawn.

karlog

starbelgrade wrote: »

I got into a fight with a big fish once.

I battered it.

Did you use a right hook.

El Weirdo

Tiddlypeeps wrote: »

Why would the EU want them to throw dead fish back into the sea?

For the halibut.

dreamers75

Could the fishermen not use smaller nets to ensure they dont go over the quota? Save on the labour used to throw them back in too.

SeaFields

dreamers75 wrote: »

Could the fishermen not use smaller nets to ensure they dont go over the quota? Save on the labour used to throw them back in too.

Your quota is your quota whether you achieve it in one sweep of the net or twenty. However, for example, if you have you quota for cod reached but still have plenty of whiting to catch, you can keep fishing for whiting but essentially you will be fishing the same fishing grounds. Therefore any cod that you catch, in your pursuit of whiting, must be thrown overboard - dead.

EU bureaucracy at its finest

Duggy747

starbelgrade wrote: »

I got into a fight with a big fish once.

I battered it.

Sanjuro wrote: »

You're codding us.

chin_grin wrote: »

Right time, right plaice.

MrStuffins wrote: »

You're talking cobblers!

Flimbos wrote: »

Holy carp, this thread sure beats looking at internet prawn.

karlog wrote: »

Did you use a right hook.

You can't bait a good pun.












*groan*

some_dose

While it was a good show to highlight the very serious and dangerous problem, there is much that the public did not see.

1. The program was very sympathetic towards commercial fishermen and highlighted their plight in particular. What wasn't mentioned was the huge subsides that fishermen receive for fuel and commissioning of new vessels. Do not feel bad for the fishermen - after all when mines run dry, miners are laid off as the resource becomes fully exploited. Same with the fishermen - they have no-one to blame but themselves. Their greed got them and us to this posistion today.

2. I felt that fishery scientists (of which I am one) were poorly represented. At the end of the day, the scientists advice should be heeded in relation to conservation of stocks, it's what we are here and paid for. However, every year scientists all over Europe work hard and produce advice for fishery ministers for quotas for the upcoming year. This advice is, for all intents and purposes, completely disregarded. This year the Marine Institute of Ireland (one of the leading organisations in the world) recommended a 22% decrease in quotas to protect our stocks. Our fisheries minister went to the EU with this scientific advice and argued and as a result we only have a 0.9% decrease in quotas. What is the point in the government paying scientists to give them advice and then completely disregard it? You might as well not have the scientists there in the first place.

3. Some of the fishermen were saying that "scientists should come out on the boats" with them. Fact of the matter is that the majority of fishermen actively prevent observers from coming on board their vessels.

4. While "loads" of cod were seen in the nets, it still pales in comparison to what it would have been like 30-40 years ago.

What people don't seem to understand it the gravity of the situation - it has been predicted by the top fishery scientists in the world that, if current exploitation rates continue, there will be no commercially viable fish stocks in the world's ocean by 2050. Link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1533125/All-seafood-will-run-out-in-2050-say-scientists.html

That's 39 years.

No tinned tuna, no smoked salmon, no cod, no mackeral. Ever again.

topper75

SeaFields wrote: »

Your quota is your quota whether you achieve it in one sweep of the net or twenty. However, for example, if you have you quota for cod reached but still have plenty of whiting to catch, you can keep fishing for whiting but essentially you will be fishing the same fishing grounds. Therefore any cod that you catch, in your pursuit of whiting, must be thrown overboard - dead.

EU bureaucracy at its finest

I don't like the EU but we need quotas. What do you propose?

Even with the quotas, they are raping the oceans (and not just the ones near us). Check out The End of the Line. Very sad but sobering documentary.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bedirwk95Oc

some_dose

topper75 wrote: »

I don't like the EU but we need quotas. What do you propose?

Limited days at sea landing everything you catch. No discards. Less in subsides to fishermen. A more varied choice of fish in fish mongers.

The 'no discards' policy in in place in Norway and works perfectly. Look at their fishery - huge cod.

What must be done first is that we MUST leave the Common Fisheries. Simple as. We have lost billions as a result of joining mainly due to Spanish and French trawlers fishing in our waters. We (Ireland) is no shining light either - the world's largest trawler, the Atlantic Dawn (http://www.noble-house.tk/html/engels/Fishes/Atlantic_Dawn_replaces_fisherman.htm), is Irish owned and is so big it is banned from EU waters so it currently operates off the coast of Africa raping the oceans of poor countries who sell their fishing rights to the EU for pittance.

SeaFields

topper75 wrote: »

I don't like the EU but we need quotas. What do you propose?

Yes, i agree with you that we definitely need quotas. I can't propose any solution because i don't know how the quota process works but there must be a better solution to allowing the dead fish go back.

I am a very keen leisure angler so the sight of trawlers usually gets under my skin, especially when i see them close to shore taking hundreds of what I would be glad to catch one or two of. But if a solution could be found to allowing the dead fish be counted so as to make the overall catch smaller , then I would be glad to see it.

Thanks for vid link, but i have see it before.

Cookie_Monster

SeaFields wrote: »

Your quota is your quota whether you achieve it in one sweep of the net or twenty. However, for example, if you have you quota for cod reached but still have plenty of whiting to catch, you can keep fishing for whiting but essentially you will be fishing the same fishing grounds. Therefore any cod that you catch, in your pursuit of whiting, must be thrown overboard - dead.

EU bureaucracy at its finest

so you should just be allowed to catch as much of whatever you want and stocks be damned?

While its not an ideal solution keeping the supply limited and low reduces the number and size of boats and reduces the number of fish caught. Fish caught plus dead throw back is still much smaller than what it previously was before the current quotas.

The ideal solution would be live sorting where fish above quota would simply be released back unharmed but we are a long way from having that possibility aboard a standard fishing boat.

SeaFields

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

so you should just be allowed to catch as much of whatever you want and stocks be damned?

I don't believe I said that. I just summarised the present situation.

topper75

The big Irish factory ship is an international disgrace. Irish greed isn't limited to banks and developers.

Leaving the common fisheries would mean a policing headache. Navies ain't cheap to run and our waters are huge. We can't manage as it is.

I'm not convinced Norwegian policies will lead to a resurgence in cod.

Nulty

zerks wrote: »

Watched an episode of this last night on CH4,it's on all this week.Highlights the waste of tonnes upon tonnes of fish due to crazy EU quotas.
Couldn't help but get angry watching perfectly good cod etc. being thrown overboard,with millions starving in the world why not simply have an intervention scheme or better still scrap the quotas and come up with a new fishery program.

I dont eat wild fish anymore in protest. Cod is all but extinct in many places. Its a small price to pay for the marine eco system

some_dose

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

The ideal solution would be live sorting where fish above quota would simply be released back unharmed but we are a long way from having that possibility aboard a standard fishing boat.

Oh that would be ideal. However, the damage caused by the nets and chains, the exhaustion of having to swim for up to 5 hours (the duration of time that the nets are being trawled behind the boat) and the sudden change in pressure as the nets are hauled which causes the swim bladder in fish, particularly gadoids such as cod and haddock, to blow means very few fish are alive when dumped on deck.

punchdrunk

I'm sick of these tur-bot,good for nothing EU bureaucrats

some_dose

topper75 wrote: »

The big Irish factory ship is an international disgrace. Irish greed isn't limited to banks and developers.

Leaving the common fisheries would mean a policing headache. Navies ain't cheap to run and our waters are huge. We can't manage as it is.

I'm not convinced Norwegian policies will lead to a resurgence in cod.

The guy who built the ship, Kevin McHugh, built it knowing full well it would be banned from EU waters (he wanted it to be so the boat could fish off the African coast where it catches up to 600 tonnes of fish per trawl). His other boat, the Veronica, was 104m an until the construction of the Atlantic Dawn, was the largest trawler in the world.

Yes leaving the Common Fisheries would present a whole load of problems - however, in 50 years time I want to be able to go into a restaurant and see cod on the menu. What price are we willing to put on our environment and our biodiversity?

The Norwegian policies are in their infancy. Scotland are adapting it this year and installing CCTV on their boats to enforce it. It is, at least, a step in the right direction. However not one word was mentioned last night about net design for protecting cod and other species. A device known as a Swedish grid (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6N-4PYYTM6-1&_user=10&_coverDate=04/30/2008&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_origin=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1604791374&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=07cb84e65a24a59edb7532e6424d5510&searchtype=a) have shown to be up to 100% effective in reducing cod in nets. Why aren't these being used? Why isn't our fishery minister out there trying to do his be to save our fisheries?

Canis Lupus

I love fish but stopped eating it because of how wasteful the industry is. It's utterly utterly utterly unbelievable how much death and waste is created by just one trawler alone.

Canis Lupus

Nulty wrote: »

I dont eat wild fish anymore in protest. Cod is all but extinct in many places. Its a small price to pay for the marine eco system

I believe that farmed fish are fed fishmeal so buying farmed fish is still adding to the problem.

SeaFields

some_dose wrote: »

However not one word was mentioned last night about net design for protecting cod and other species. A device known as a Swedish grid (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6N-4PYYTM6-1&_user=10&_coverDate=04/30/2008&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_origin=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1604791374&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=07cb84e65a24a59edb7532e6424d5510&searchtype=a) have shown to be up to 100% effective in reducing cod in nets. Why aren't these being used? Why isn't our fishery minister out there trying to do his be to save our fisheries?

Off the top of my head the same presenter of that program did a program last year on sustainable fishing. One of the things he examined was various net designs to avoid catching undersized fish. I assume he will revisit this topic in a future episode of this series as the theme in a lot of his programs are anti big industry.


And to those of you who say ye dont eat fish anymore because of the industry, why not go out and catch yer own! Doesnt get more sustainable than that.

topper75

People back in the 19th century could never ever have believed in low cod stocks. It seemed to be invincible as a species - a voracious omnivore that lays countless eggs.

Yet mankind has done the impossible and all but destoyed cod in a relatively short space of time.

We may repeat that mistake now again in the 21st century with ocean fish stocks in general.

I think it is not unethical to eat from sustainable fisheries. I wouldn't stop eating fish altogether but I would try to be mindful of how it is caught and by whom.

Read "Cod - The History of the Fish that Changed the World" by Mark Kurlansky.

some_dose

topper75 wrote: »

People back in the 19th century could never ever have believed in low cod stocks. It seemed to be invincible as a species - a voracious omnivore that lays countless eggs.

Yet mankind has done the impossible and all but destoyed cod in a relatively short space of time.

We may repeat that mistake now again in the 21st century with ocean fish stocks in general.

I think it is not unethical to eat from sustainable fisheries. I wouldn't stop eating fish altogether but I would try to be mindful of how it is caught and by whom.

Read "Cod - The History of the Fish that Changed the World" by Mark Kurlansky.

The thing is though that people would not have to do much to actually force a change. Just buy fish from sustainable stocks - look for line/pole caught tuna when buying tinned tuna and look for MSC (Marine Stewardship Council) approved fish when buying other frozen fish. Also try buy Irish fish, we have it all here so there is no need for us to import it.

If you buy your fish from a fishmonger, ask him where it was caught and how it was caught (those of you buying cod from Irish waters, anything off the south coast of Ireland is relatively ok). Avoid trawled fish, instead opt for seine netted or long-lined fish. Or even better yet, change your preference and try more sustainable and healthier fish such as mackerel and sardines!

sensibleken

Tiddlypeeps wrote: »

Why would the EU want them to throw dead fish back into the sea?

because they have no sole

--Kaiser--

sensibleken wrote: »

because they have no sole

I was whiting for that one

thefly

Anyone know where I can buy line or pole caught tuna in dublin?

Sport101

Have found both episodes pretty disappointing so far to be honest.

The disgraceful issue is not that the fishermen in the first episode have to discard dead fish (as they are over their quotas), its that they continue to fish in the areas where they know full well that they will catch certain types of fish and then have to discard them. This is somewhat mindboggling as fishermen are well aware of the current scientific evidence which states that current quotas are not even low enough to help stocks recover. Clearly the quota system does not work if they are killing the fish anyway, but instead of addressing this issue themselves and trying to figure a way not to needlessly catch fish whose quotas have been used up, they catch them anyway and blame the EU, typical. When stocks disappear they will have noone to blame but themselves.

The EU is not the main villain in this story, but unfortunately that's not the message that came across from the first episode.

The second episode seemed to be more focused on sharks, dolphins and turtles, once again missing the bigger issue of many tuna stocks endangerment.

The series seems like a missed opportunity, but hopefully it will raise awareness about the bigger problem of overfishing, and result in people educating themselves on the main issues and endangered species.

I do like the Mackerel in the chipper bit though.

quickbeam

I didn't see the original program but just saw Hugh whatsisname on The One Show. I don't really get his point. Throwing dead fish back isn't a good thing of course, but he offered no alternative solutions. I looked on the website too. Wouldn't things be a lot worse if there were no quotas and the fishermen could take what they want? I know fishermen have to make a living but it's really no excuse if your job results in the extinction of animals and the ecological distruction of their environment. Fishermen more to blame than EU, I think.

the watchman

As mentioned earlier, where can we buy Pole caught tuna????????

goose2005

SeaFields wrote: »

Saw this too. It was a good watch. Hugh Fernley Whitingstall was behind it - he had some success in last few years with a campaign to stop intensive chicken breeding in the UK.

For those that dont know, once a trawler reaches its quota for a certain species, it must throw back any more of that species that it catches. And since nets cant discriminate as to what they catch, a lot of dead fish get thrown overboard.

Basically the EU are retarded.

If they didn't force them to do that, fisherman could just "accidentally" go over the limit and then sell the extra fish.

smash

did anyone catch the Joe Duffy piece this week regarding commercial Bass fishing? I missed it but I heard Joe was being even more or a dick than usual.

sensibleken

smash wrote: »

did anyone catch the Joe Duffy piece this week regarding commercial Bass fishing? I missed it but I heard Joe was being even more or a dick than usual.

the only way he vould possibly be that is if he was broadcasting live from inside a vagina!