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Just before going to press with our December Issue of Woods 'N Water Magazine, we recieved this notice from NOAA and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).


NOAA FISHERIES SERVICE NEWS RELEASE
SOUTHEAST REGIONAL OFFICE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

November 21, 2006

Media Contact:
Kim Amendola - NOAA
727-551-5707


Recreational Grouper Fishing Closure Announced for Gulf of Mexico
Seasonal Closure to happen February 15 through March 15



NOAA Fisheries Service announces a February 15 through March 15 seasonal closure for the recreational red grouper, black grouper, and gag fisheries in federal waters of the Gulf of Mexico. The seasonal closure will occur annually, and coincides with the commercial grouper fishery closure established in 2000.

NOAA Fisheries Service initially intended to implement the recreational seasonal closure when it reduced the recreational red grouper bag limit earlier in 2006. However, the agency delayed implementation of the seasonal closure in response to concerns about the closure and knowledge that a new gag assessment was pending. The gag assessment, completed in August 2006, indicates the stock is undergoing overfishing.

“We thought it was a good idea to wait for the gag assessment before determining the need for a seasonal closure,â€

DANGIT, that's my favorite time ta be out there to by the time I retire, I'll have ta sneak out there ta catch a fish

Its too windy anyway that time of year, i'll just have to double up the other month's !

Didn't they do the same thing last year?

wevans wrote:DANGIT, that's my favorite time ta be out there to by the time I retire, I'll have ta sneak out there ta catch a fish

Go get 'em Wevans. If they lock you up, I'll come bail you out.

Thanks for passing the info

"a 6,000-pound commercial grouper trip limit"


NOAA. We are not idiots. We KNOW who is making the rules....


ridiculous......

Typical Bureaucratic dumbassness....(Ok maybe it ain't a word), but it works in this sentence....

Dubble

Ditto that Dubble.

These guys may be running into the same problem that got their last recreational closure partially overturned by the courts. I'm sure that a lot of you remember that they outlawed gags even though they had no documentation of overfishing of this species. The court, in what may be a first for them, must have decided to actually read the law instead of making up its own. They basically found that the law did not allow the Council to outlaw fishing in the absence of documentation that these other species were threatened.

Thus, the Council's speculation that fishing pressure would shift to gags and that this justified imposing restrictions on them too was not lawful. The court, by the way, didn't question the validity of the data as many others did.

I now wonder if similar logic might apply to their decision to outlaw black grouper fishing in the absence of data to suggest that they are being overfished. In this instance, their rationale is to spare us from confusion. I wonder if this is any more acceptable according to the law than the rationale they used last year.

Anyway, I think that we're dealing with people that take great joy out of gigging recreational fishermen. We may also be paying a price for the sucessful challenge last year. As you know, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned unless it's a bureaucrat spanked. The courts will rightfully be very reluctant to question the validity of "data" used by an agency in support of its lawful mission. Since the Council looks like it primarily uses survey data, I think they can easily design surveys to show any outcome they want, much like politicians do during heated campaigns. We may be facing a mud minnow ban any day now.

I'm afraid we're in for tough times ahead if we cannot persuade Congress to step in and provide meaningful oversight and to strengthen the law. The Council seems to have too much unilateral authority to impose fisheries restrictions based on questionable data.

We can at least hold out hope that our FWC does not follow suit in our state waters without a clear case being made that the restrictions are necessary to preserve the resource.