Fish Fight

[immunecfg]

http://us1.campaign-archive.com/?u=f7af ... 6f704e7355

Its going to be on channel 4 tonight.

Seeing this is being bought to a wider and public audience this might get the message through to the politians.

[seanie35]

watching this now some waste of fish imagine what the full european total of discards really is

[d.kane62]

so much for your few cod for the table seanie and all the crap ye had to read. hard to believe this is goin on in this age.damian

[saving private brian]

watched this and it made me sick,and u think of all the people starving in the world,xxxx the eu

[gfkelly1969]

one point I thought was good is what the captain of the fishing boat said about letting them land every fish they catch but to have a time limit on the amount of time they can stay out,at least that way there would be no waste

[Donnyboy1]

Disappointed by it.

I think the quota's are the right way to go, but hugh is not too interested in the science of it... rather he is more interested in the waste of it....
The technique of trawling the bottom of our oceans is wrong and should be stopped... any talk or focus on bycatch is incedential (although I agree it is a shame, there were some lovely fish being chucked over the side!).

I compare it to the advancement of technology of the railway system. When the steam engines were replaced with coal we didn't have have all the steam engineers going to the america's or European governments moaning about their livelihood.... same with the change from coal to diesel and electricity....move with the times and quit moaning.

people need to move with the times and the days of throwing a big bucket into the ocean and raping our waters are long gone.... I feel bad for the fishermen, but then remind myself that for the most part they are the ones responsible for the situation they are in now. In a different program I saw a great analogy... they purchased the best of technology (sonar, radar, boats, nets etc) to find and catch the best fish but when the best fish is gone they still owe the banks and are in the sh1t now.

I really wish Hugh would focus on shutting down the fisheries and their current method of fishing...trawlers are destroying the oceans full stop.

[petekd]

Interesting programme and I cant help but feel a tinge of sympathy for the commercial fleet, which, from me, is saying something but I suppose the more you learn, the more your views mellow. The basic fact as I see it is this... The quota system, however well meaning is fundamentally flawed. The reality is that whatever legislation is put into place, boat owners, skippers etc have to work the system to make as much money as is possible within the boundaries they are constrained within. If they are involved in that industry, then I guess they have every right to do such, ie run their business to be as profitable as possible. We all cheer when quotas are cut as happened recently, fact is that skippers with commitments will have to divert their attentions to filling quotas on other species resulting in ever more discards, totally defeating the purpose of the quota system in the first place.

Scientists/politicians, for the love of god, sit down and work out what a reasonable return is from our waters and how many vessels it can comfortably stand to harvest that and decommission the rest. If that involves, and it undoubtedly would, compensating individuals thenfor gods sakes get on with it. We can throw billions at the banks for heavens sakes.... These guys have to be able to land everything they catch. Discards should be banned altogether, there is no justification for throwing 1 single fish over the side as waste. Cut down the fleet and impose restrictions on days at sea, its the only way forward as far as I can see it. There is a lot of propaganda peddled on both sides of the argument, lets face it. However, simple fact is this, if a skipper landed everything he caught and only had to fish a third of the time to make the same money as he does now at it fulltime with a totally unacceptable and morally reprehensible amount of discards then why is this not the way forward in a bid to "save our seas".

[petekd]

Oh, and semi pompous buffoon as he sometimes comes across, I have to say fair play to Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall, always eager, always sincere and often educational. Be it taking up the plight of chickens, potting rabbits or trying to save our seas. Eminently watchable, hats off.

[fastnet]

Fair play to Hugh F-W.

The highlight for me was when he asked the Minister for fisheries to identify the fish, and he hadn't a clue....typical ....those that make the rules are so removed from the business that they don't realise how things affect the men on the ground.

The easiest way to regulate quota is to increase the minimum size to above reproductive size ,and to prosecute severely for landing undersize fish.
This will force fishermen to use larger mesh and to stay out of nursery areas.Escape panels should be installed in prawn gear to minimise fish catches....ie you either want to catch fish or prawns...not both.

A box containing 40kg of 2kg cod contains 20 fish wheras a box of 5kg fish kills only 8 fish......simple.

[nicefish]

It certainly put a new meaning on "Catch and release". Last year I seen a documentary on the same issue, they were larger trawlers and the fish they were throwing back was beyond belief. For anyone who doesn't practice catch and release you can sleep safe and sound I know I can.

[fishermannum1]

a real sickening thing to watch. so i signed the this http://dev.fishfight.net/sign-up/
it only takes a minute guys to sign it. it might not do any good, but at least we are trying.

[doggie3131]

a great programme which highlights the waste, quotas just dont work,the only way quotas can work as far as im concerned is quota by tonnage,each boat gets a tonnage of fish there allowed to land,which covers ALL species,and when there quota is landed then they stop fishing,simple,decommissioning irish boats wont work if french,spanish,english and scottish boats are not decommishioned as well.what came across was how affected the commerical boys were, when they calculated how much they were wasteing.one even saying he felt like a crook.

[shamoo0804]

Hopefully the program will bring about serious change to our fisheries management.

I'm a little sceptical however of the idea of a "tonnage" quota for each boat as proposed by some of you.

If a skipper still has plenty of time left at sea, but is near his overall "tonnage" quota, what is to stop him disgarding lower value species in order to try to catch more valuable fish to fill his quota

[Big Ben]

Hi,

I think the programme was very good.When people think of discards they often think of undersize fish so it was intereting to see the volume of mature fish being discarded. It is more representative of what actually happens. If the EU is infamous for fraud and ineptitute why do we think they can run fisheries. They are currently trying to give Norway access to Irish waters so French and Spanish boats can fish in Norway.This is an admittance of their own mismanagement.The science is flawed and estimates of fish populations as reliable as election polls.
If a quota was introduced for all fish caught it would help.Skippers may become selective as the end of their quota nears but it would still make a massive difference.
It was also interesting to see the amount of cod caught close to the shore at Hastings, I wish we had that in Inishowen Angling heaven

[twinkle]

its a huge amount of by waste. in stead of dumping it back could it not be processed in to fish feed or chicken feed that way it wont be dumped. and they get some form of monetery gain from landing it.it will also fill the hull up.a well made program which will make a lot of people aware of whats going on. but if the end of the line film dident do that already i doubt this`will

[chenz116]

lets get involved

http://www.fishfight.net/

[Donnyboy1]

Just watched the latest episode.... thats what I'm talking about....

Eliminate the massive nets, use your head set up the floats, water jets, baitfish, and target the tuna directly!

0% bycatch.... thats the only way to stick to the fishing quota's....

We should investigate if its possible to do something similar for our fisheries. I know its done in some places for pollock with a jigging machine + 0% bycatch.

[KERRY1]

I watched this last night and I personally found it to be both very interesting and sickening.
Fair play to Hugh for the effort he is making to highlight this problem to the masses. His aim and goal at the end of it is to try and bring about changes in legislation and policy regarding the issues brought up in the programme mainly about the laws that concern quota's, bye catches and the methods used to currently catch fish (nets etc) but I am not sure Brussels will listen. This has been going on in our seas for a long time now and it just seems to be getting worse instead of better despite lobbying and protesting in the past so is this going to make a difference now? I hope it does but I am not so sure. Something needs to be done and fast before our seas and its fish stocks are destroyed beyond repair for good.
I felt completely sick to the stomach when I seen the poor sharks and rays, as well as dolphins that are being caught up in the nets being used by some fisherman out at sea and then I felt even worse when I seen them being thrown over the side again and disregarded as if they were worth nothing!! some of which were at this stage dead or close to it.
Something needs to be done to stop this bad practice and waste and fast but in a way that doesn’t deplete our fish stocks any further or harm our marine environment. Our seas and its creatures are priceless and should be protected and treated with respect.

[immunecfg]

There was a show on last night also tonight and friday night, everyone can they put the link on face book other forums etc get this ball moving and bring this madness to an end!

for anyone who didnt get to see the fish fight here it is on youtube on 4oD's channel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ROBFw3AHnU

PS

you have to watch it from youtube

[finding nemo]

Great to see Hugh get this in the public eye. I never knew how much fish was just chuked back dead. Its absolute madness.
What annoyed me was seeing cod on the deck still moving but they still put them along the conveyer belt.
GET IT BACK IN THE WATER!!!!

Dont know how they will sort this out but this show will defo open some eyes.