YA YA THE NET BAN IS LIFTED

[Gumbo]

Rule 9.310 of the Rules of Appellate Procedure allows the trial judge to lift the stay. The appellate court has the authority to reinstate it.

[reelbad]

Just read Jerry's article in the paper. I do not agree even though he has a right to his opinion, when he states that there are other jobs and different skills that these people can do besides catching mullet for the all mighty dollar. The mullet fisherman might just tell you to go find a new job because they do not like your fishing section or your opinions. Is that not the reason you write the fishing section in the paper Jerry, to help provide a living for you and your family? I guess we could all do something different if we chose to. Not angry Jerry, just don't agree how you can so easily tell someone to go do something different.

[Mister Mullet]

Yes, but I don't earn my living by depriving others of theirs (guides, tackle shop owners, fishing tackle manufacturers, hotels, car rental agencies, food establishments, boat and motor manufacturers, etc.) I can almost guarantee the price of mullet has dropped to almost nothing because of the glut of fish taken in the last few days. So you're going to catch more to earn less. We went through this 20 years ago. Another week of this round-the-clock netting and Apalachee Bay is dead.

[MuleTrainGA]

Harvest for the sake of harvest will yield overfishing. Though the net ban has been lifted for a period of time, restraint is still needed by anglers to not flood the market. Sadly, if someone harvests sustainably, there are usually three more who don't even consider sustainability.

[Salty Gator]

Harvest for the sake of harvest will yield overfishing. Though the net ban has been lifted for a period of time, restraint is still needed by anglers to not flood the market. Sadly, if someone harvests sustainably, there are usually three more who don't even consider sustainability.

I think we can all agree that commercial fishing is not an easy way to make a living. If it gets too hard of non productive you have the option to find a new way to make a living. Just because your dad did it one way doesn't guarantee your right to do it the same way that he did. The profession I am in has drastically changed over the last 20 years, and it is much harder to make a living than it was when I made the decision to pursue my dream. Times change, laws change and of it gets too hard you can adapt, change jobs or cheat.

[GaryDroze]

I suppose most of us form our net ban opinions from a combination of information and experience, with the latter factor amplifying our position.

For me, the most memorable opinion-shaping experience came during a wadefishing hike six Octobers ago. The moon was draining Horns Creek that foggy weekday morning. Calculating that few would be launching under such conditions, I was looking forward to wading and casting in solitude, and maybe slogging the mud banks of Horns all the way to the flats as I followed the outgoing tide.

I only made it halfway to the mouth.

After rounding one bend in the waterway, I spotted a net boat in the mist, with three gents aboard. Two of them were in the process of stringing a net ALL THE WAY ACROSS Horns Creek. The third dude, in the bow, cradled a shotgun. I ducked back around the bend and hunkered in the marsh grass until they finished their business. I couldn't see every type of fish they pulled in over the next half hour, but the splashing was relentless.

Maybe the bright side is if the ban is revoked and this kind of activity is legal again, there's less chance I'll have a vacation day ruined due to getting my ass shot off on Horns Creek.

[Sea Dawg]

Well i guess when i started the Tread I just wanted to see some of the people true colors that clams to be holy thou and i have.. and i have.. My self tho i could give a Rat ass what they doing about the mullet or rec fishing..when they droped the rec limit for the reds and trout and how some people squealed...Well that whats going on right now ..And im sitting back in my porch on 1 acre of heaven watching the river flow south to the gulf seeing some of the rec fishermen going out inin and back out after storing the 1st limit..with some saying well i drove 150 miles so i need more fish hahahahahahas

[DEMON]

Well i guess when i started the Tread I just wanted to see some of the people true colors that clams to be holy thou and i have.. and i have.. My self tho i could give a Rat ass what they doing about the mullet or rec fishing..when they droped the rec limit for the reds and trout and how some people squealed...Well that whats going on right now ..And im sitting back in my porch on 1 acre of heaven watching the river flow south to the gulf seeing some of the rec fishermen going out inin and back out after storing the 1st limit..with some saying well i drove 150 miles so i need more fish hahahahahahas

If you are seeing violations whether rec or commercial, I encourage you to report it to FWC. Contact them by phone @ 888-404-FWCC (3922) or you can text them @ "Tip@MyFWC.com". You might even get a reward out of it.

[silverking]

Yours is not an isolated incident, Gary. I have had several confrontations with netting poachers over the years since the ban. Criminal activity runs across the board, from gill netters to so-called "rec" anglers who keep more than their limits. But if anyone truly cares about these publicly-owned resources and you witness any violations you should report it to the authorities. To do otherwise is condoning theft.

The constitutional amendment to limit gill and entanglement nets is not going to be revoked. It was passed by an overwhelming majority of voters and has been upheld numerous times in legal challenges. And this latest attempt to circumvent the intent will also be heard in court, hopefully soon, and getting it on the docket should trigger a stay of the current free-for-all carnage taking place in Apalachee Bay. Semantics, sympathetic judges and judicial authority aside, a stretched mesh larger than 2 inches is a gill net, plain and simple. If the plaintiffs are truly interested in protecting baby fish, a hand-thrown cast net which is actively fished and controllable is the logical--and responsible--choice. The quality of cast-net fish is better and quality products bring a higher return to the harvester. Under the current scenario, the market will be flooded and mullet will be worth pennies per pound. And by the way, Japan is suffering an economic downturn as well, so mullet roe isn't the gold mine it once was for part-time carpenters, roofers, landscapers and others who tried to cash in on the get-rich quick scheme. Is cast-netting hard work? Of course it is. But in a supply-and-demand economy those who put forth the effort can make a decent living if market conditions are equal.

Legal seines are also viable gear. According to the FWC's landings data, 579,527 pounds of mullet were landed in Wakulla, Franklin, Jefferson, and Dixie Counties in 2010 and 493,614 pounds in 2011. Total statewide landings of mullet in 2011 were 12.5 million pounds, using allowable seines with a smaller mesh size and allowable cast nets.

Some of us who were involved with the original amendment language felt that cast nets should have been the sole commercial option, but the majority argued successfully for inclusion of small seines for bait and commercial harvest. In hindsight, if we had gone with the former we wouldn't have had 18 years of ruses like tarp nets and never-ending litigation. And honest, hard-working legitimate commercial fishers could have transitioned successfully to other opportunities on the water such as crabbing, cast-netting, hook-and-line, aquaculture or guiding without sacrificing their independence and way of life.

[Mister Mullet]

Well said, Silverking. Wonder how things are going down south? Also, rumor has it that the bottom has dropped out of the mullet market in Panacea. Surprise. Surprise. Surprise.

[Mister Mullet]

here's a petition we all should sign, from CCA http://www.yousign.org/en/netbanpetition

[CSMarine]

Well if you "want to see my true colors" on this issue, sorry but I have so many color about the net ban that even I'm not sure how I feel about it. I was mostly raised by a third generation net fisherman on the Aucilla River (my grandfather.) Many cold frosty mornings I'd have to help him shuck the mullet out of his net in the morning before I got on the school bus. More than a few days of missed school so that I could ride on my grandmother's fish truck delievering fish door to door in Perry. That's just the way it was in the late fifties and early sixties for children and grand children of mullet fishermen. When the net ban went into effect, it devestated our family. My grandfather was 70 years old and had never had a payrole check in his life. Same with his five sons who were in thier late forties. The sons found other ways to make a living, which finally landed three of them in prison, and causing the government to take the family property on the river. That property is now the public boat ramp you all use on the lower Aucilla. My grandfather, who had lived and worked on the river all his life just could not cope with having it taken away. His finances failed, then his health failed when he was forced to move into a small house in Perry, and leave his beloved Aucilla. He died a short time later.
Did the net ban cause this? Well hell yes it caused it! Could my family have found something else to make a living at as some of you suggest? Maybe, but it's not that easy for some who have lived a life of freedom from government meddling, and laws that change a way of life as old as Florida itself. Did it help the natural resourses of the state? Maybe. Did it help the Trout fishing on the Gulf that much? I wonder. The ban put thousands of families in the Big Bend in the poor house, but those same do-gooders allowed Proctor and Gamble, Buckeye, Tenneco and all the fuel docks in St. Marks and other large polluters to continue to dump chemicals into the rivers and bay to the point that most of the seagrass was killed from mud choking it out from runoffs from all the coastal clearcuts, and the chemicals being dumped changing the makeup of the tidal areas where Trout and Reds live. The fishing is only fraction of what it was before the net ban. So I'd say don't blame that completly on the nets, blame it more on the money dogs who run the large industries in our area and live thousands of miles away from the damage they cause. Get as passionate about pollution in our rivers and bays as we do about a net ban, or someone taking two fish more than the law says he can, and we might help the coast of the Big Bend a lot more.

[SS-342]

Well if you "want to see my true colors" on this issue, sorry but I have so many color about the net ban that even I'm not sure how I feel about it. I was mostly raised by a third generation net fisherman on the Aucilla River (my grandfather.) Many cold frosty mornings I'd have to help him shuck the mullet out of his net in the morning before I got on the school bus. More than a few days of missed school so that I could ride on my grandmother's fish truck delievering fish door to door in Perry. That's just the way it was in the late fifties and early sixties for children and grand children of mullet fishermen. When the net ban went into effect, it devestated our family. My grandfather was 70 years old and had never had a payrole check in his life. Same with his five sons who were in thier late forties. The sons found other ways to make a living, which finally landed three of them in prison, and causing the government to take the family property on the river. That property is now the public boat ramp you all use on the lower Aucilla. My grandfather, who had lived and worked on the river all his life just could not cope with having it taken away. His finances failed, then his health failed when he was forced to move into a small house in Perry, and leave his beloved Aucilla. He died a short time later.
Did the net ban cause this? Well hell yes it caused it! Could my family have found something else to make a living at as some of you suggest? Maybe, but it's not that easy for some who have lived a life of freedom from government meddling, and laws that change a way of life as old as Florida itself. Did it help the natural resourses of the state? Maybe. Did it help the Trout fishing on the Gulf that much? I wonder. The ban put thousands of families in the Big Bend in the poor house, but those same do-gooders allowed Proctor and Gamble, Buckeye, Tenneco and all the fuel docks in St. Marks and other large polluters to continue to dump chemicals into the rivers and bay to the point that most of the seagrass was killed from mud choking it out from runoffs from all the coastal clearcuts, and the chemicals being dumped changing the makeup of the tidal areas where Trout and Reds live. The fishing is only fraction of what it was before the net ban. So I'd say don't blame that completly on the nets, blame it more on the money dogs who run the large industries in our area and live thousands of miles away from the damage they cause. Get as passionate about pollution in our rivers and bays as we do about a net ban, or someone taking two fish more than the law says he can, and we might help the coast of the Big Bend a lot more.

Amen!

Man will find a way to mess things up! There ain't no such thing as "Sailor Proof"!

Now, if we could blend CSM's statement and Silverking's….I might could live with that. I saw a giant of a man over in Destin catch a boat load of mullet for the market with a cast net. It can be done. I'm all for those hard working families who make a hard living from the sea. They need help because they sure as heck don't have much power as do the big companies.

In this world $ money $ talks and most fishermen I've seen don"t have much.

That being said, I signed the Net Ban petition. Seems now days common sense don't work!

[EddieJoe]

Yours is not an isolated incident, Gary. I have had several confrontations with netting poachers over the years since the ban. Criminal activity runs across the board, from gill netters to so-called "rec" anglers who keep more than their limits. But if anyone truly cares about these publicly-owned resources and you witness any violations you should report it to the authorities. To do otherwise is condoning theft.

The constitutional amendment to limit gill and entanglement nets is not going to be revoked. It was passed by an overwhelming majority of voters and has been upheld numerous times in legal challenges. And this latest attempt to circumvent the intent will also be heard in court, hopefully soon, and getting it on the docket should trigger a stay of the current free-for-all carnage taking place in Apalachee Bay. Semantics, sympathetic judges and judicial authority aside, a stretched mesh larger than 2 inches is a gill net, plain and simple. If the plaintiffs are truly interested in protecting baby fish, a hand-thrown cast net which is actively fished and controllable is the logical--and responsible--choice. The quality of cast-net fish is better and quality products bring a higher return to the harvester. Under the current scenario, the market will be flooded and mullet will be worth pennies per pound. And by the way, Japan is suffering an economic downturn as well, so mullet roe isn't the gold mine it once was for part-time carpenters, roofers, landscapers and others who tried to cash in on the get-rich quick scheme. Is cast-netting hard work? Of course it is. But in a supply-and-demand economy those who put forth the effort can make a decent living if market conditions are equal.

Legal seines are also viable gear. According to the FWC's landings data, 579,527 pounds of mullet were landed in Wakulla, Franklin, Jefferson, and Dixie Counties in 2010 and 493,614 pounds in 2011. Total statewide landings of mullet in 2011 were 12.5 million pounds, using allowable seines with a smaller mesh size and allowable cast nets.

Some of us who were involved with the original amendment language felt that cast nets should have been the sole commercial option, but the majority argued successfully for inclusion of small seines for bait and commercial harvest. In hindsight, if we had gone with the former we wouldn't have had 18 years of ruses like tarp nets and never-ending litigation. And honest, hard-working legitimate commercial fishers could have transitioned successfully to other opportunities on the water such as crabbing, cast-netting, hook-and-line, aquaculture or guiding without sacrificing their independence and way of life.

Great post. And, as much as I don't like doing this sort of thing, Ronald Fred has turned a corner with me. No more of my business, even though he has a fine store with reasonable prices and is a likable guy. He can't play both sides of the street and expect us to smile and bend over, again and again. I suspect the resource has already paid a penalty for his posturing and that's not right.

EJ

[Mister Mullet]

Just wait until dead mullet carcasses, stripped of their roe, start floating to the surface. Who's making money off this disaster...why the fish houses. They keep out of the spotlight but continue to buy at a much lower price then ship the roe overseas for the wealthy elete to eat. You guys live in shacks down by the river, drive 20-year-old rusty pickups, and the swells laugh at you while they dine on the caviar you provide. You're being played. And now you're sitting out on a limb and sawing it between you and the tree. Damn, wake up guys. You're killing it for everyone.